


Harry Potter and the Serpent Items

by JoeyTaylor



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Crossover, Founders, Gen, NaNoWriMo, Unfinished, What-If, salazar with millennium tome, serpentverse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-23
Updated: 2019-03-23
Packaged: 2019-11-28 04:56:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 18
Words: 35,222
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18203819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoeyTaylor/pseuds/JoeyTaylor
Summary: When Harry entered the Chamber of Secrets he found something that will entirely change his world. Salazar Slytherin did something drastic to protect everything he and the other Founders had built...





	1. Troubling

**Author's Note:**

> This is a failed NaNoWriMo project. I like the story, I just lost where to go with it. I have a few ideas for the future of this universe, but this story has kind of dead-ended. If you wanna play in this universe, feel free but please let me know.

Harry was in deep trouble.

When he’d come home from his second year at Hogwarts it had been with triumph as he had bested a basilisk, defeated the ghost of Voldemort for a second time and saved Ginny’s life.

Except that he didn’t remember any of it.

The last thing he remembered was putting on the strange bracer he’d spotted at the bottom of the pool in the Chamber of Secrets. The next thing after that was escorting Ginny from the Chamber, sorting hat in one hand, Gryffindor’s sword in the other and a very dead basilisk behind him and he had no idea how it had happened.

Which had made explaining to everyone what had happened in the Chamber rather difficult. He’d tried to come up with something convincing but Dumbledore had known and when he’d questioned Harry on his own, the boy had shown the Headmaster the golden bracer he’d found.

Which was when Dumbledore had gained a rather odd look and told him in an enigmatic tone to take care of the bracer and told him not to worry.

Harry would have been more than happy to comply with that request, after all the bracer wasn’t exactly heavy, was obviously magical since the snake that wrapped itself around the protective piece of equipment had tightened its coils specifically to fit his arm and loosened again when he wanted to take it off at night, and the Headmaster had mentioned that it came with gifts and told him that he would give him more information when he found it.

However the blackout in the Chamber hadn’t been the only one. From the moment he’d gotten off the train and met up with his Uncle, he’d gone through the rigmarole of typical daily life with the Dursleys. Until things had started happening. Things that couldn’t possibly be classed as ‘good’.

Dudley’s friend Piers had been bullying him, Harry had had a blackout and Piers had been found the next day babbling like a lunatic.

Petunia had been starving him like she normally had, favouring her whale of a son over the nephew that she had been forced to take in when his parents had been killed and after one particularly bad morning where she’d forced him to cook breakfast but not let him prepare enough for himself, he’d had a blackout and woken up in the cupboard under the stairs with enough food to feed him for a week.

But this one had to be the worst. Uncle Vernon had started on him, about how worthless he was and how he was another mouth to feed and it wasn’t even like he was doing anything useful, and he’d clipped Harry around the head. Now this hadn’t been anything new. It had happened before. Never hard enough to do damage but it had been enough to trigger an episode and Harry had had a blackout.

Now he was on the run, kicked out of the Dursley home for having been caught at the scene of the crime, having somehow used magic to turn Vernon comatose, and he had no idea where he should go. It wouldn’t be long, he was certain, before someone reported it to the Aurors and he had a horrible feeling that ‘I don’t remember’ wouldn’t be a viable excuse. Nor would it stand up if it was taken to trial.

The problem was he had no options. He had no Muggle money and all of his wealth was tied up as wizarding galleons, sickles and knuts, which meant that before he could do anything he needed to get to Diagon Alley.

This was perfect. Except that he had absolutely no clue how to get there, short of flying on his broom, which, he supposed, he could do if he put on his invisibility cloak and it wasn’t like he could get into much more trouble than he was already in. Still it was a last bar one resort, having learnt his lesson about flying objects and how much trouble they could get you in when he and Ron had driven his dad’s flying car to school after Dobby had barricaded the gateway to platform 9 and 3/4.

“Great, just great.” Harry grouched, as he kicked the kerb, trying to think. “No train fare, no flying cars and no...” Harry trailed off as he realised that he was being watched out of the windows of number 4, Privet Drive. They’d probably already called the Muggle police to come and arrest him already and were just watching to see when it would happen.

That thought made his mind up for him. He started walking. Not to Diagon Alley of course, just away from the Dursley home, half worried about explaining himself to the police, who most definitely wouldn’t take ‘magic’ as an excuse and half worried because he still couldn’t remember what had happened to leave Vernon like he was.

“Oi! Freak!” Harry winced as his cousin caught up to him, his tone furious. Understandably so.

Dudley seized Harry by the jacket and spun him around to face him. Rage was obvious on his features and Harry had a horrible feeling he wasn’t getting out of this one without a lot of bruising.

“You better fix whatever you did to Dad or I’ll punch your face in.” Dudley threatened, meaty fist raised, prepared to strike.

“I can’t.” Harry admitted, though he knew it wouldn’t aid his situation any.

He was right, Dudley’s fist struck his stomach hard, winding the almost thirteen year old and causing him to crumple up in a ball on the ground, coughing hard.

“Fix. It. Now.” His cousin punctuated each of his growled words with a boot to Harry’s stomach, “And whatever you did to Piers.”

Harry felt it, felt the Bracer on his arm grow warm as Dudley backed off slightly, and then darkness overtook him as he fell into a warm sleep.


	2. The Leaky Cauldron

When he awoke he was on a bus. Not any kind of bus. This one was apparently called the Knight Bus and it swerved between cars at a horrendously erratic rate, squeezing itself into gaps that there was no way it should fit and somehow managing to drive up the wrong side of one of the roads entirely without being noticed by a single Muggle.

Harry had no idea how they did it, or how he had ended up on the bus in the first place, but he wasn't going to complain as moments after he had 'woken up' he arrived at Diagon Alley and had disembarked along with all of his luggage.

Part of him was curious as to what had happened to Dudley and then another part had already decided that it was a really really bad idea to ask and focused purely on getting himself inside the Leakey Cauldron and then on to Gringotts the first opportunity he had. After all if he was going to be on the run for the rest of his life the wanted to at least be able to afford food and drink, along with somewhere to stay.

The moment he walked into the wizarding pub, he knew something was up, as people had obviously noticed him, but unlike the last time he had come without the Weasleys, he wasn't mobbed. He didn't think news of what had happened in Surry could have reached here that quickly but then he couldn't know everything that was possible with magic...

"Mr Potter. Welcome." Tom, the barkeeper here, hurried over gesturing for one of his staff members to take over behind the bar before ushering Harry upstairs and out of the public eye. "I wasn't aware you were coming."

"It's an unexpected stop." Harry admitted, hoping not to get drawn into a conversation about why he was visiting. "I'm only passing through on my way to Gringotts."

"You want to be careful wandering around on your own." Tom sounded honestly concerned, "It's all over the newspapers, Sirius Black escaped from Azkaban last night and everyone's up in arms about it. It's not safe for anyone to be wondering around alone right now, least of all you."

Harry blinked at him in confusion. "What do you mean?"

"Sirius Black was a Death Eater, one of the worst." Tom looked shocked that he didn't know that, "And you're the one who stopped You-Know-Who."  Tom glanced around nervously for a moment and then continued on a completely different note, "Now if you stop here for a moment and have some of our pub grub, there's a Pure Blood family who pre-ordered their food arriving in a few minutes, the Lovegoods. They'll watch out for you and you'll never be bored."

"I don't know..." Harry hesitated. The last thing he wanted was to hang around a predominant Pure Blood family right now. Not when he was uncertain when he was going to have another black out and was trying to stay out of sight.

“They’re as loopy as fruit cakes the pair of them.” Tom continued as if Harry hadn’t spoken, “But they’re good people. Besides, the girl’s about your age. You’ve probably seen her around the school.”

The name was familiar. Harry had met a Luna Lovegood last year when everyone except his friends had thought that he was the Heir of Slytherin.  The girl had seemed fascinated by his ability to talk to snakes and had even attempted to see if she could learn a little bit, but she had been weird. There had been occasions where Luna hadn’t really seemed like herself and others where she had seemed as nutty as a fruit cake.

Thinking about it in those terms, it was probably the same family.

Harry’s grumbling stomach seemed to answer the question for Tom who ushered him into a private room and handed him a menu, “Just you wait here, Mr Potter, I’ll bring your food to you.”

Once Tom had left, taking Harry’s order and the menu with him, the black haired boy just stared after him.

“So you’ll get me into trouble, but you won’t get me out of it?” Harry grouched at the golden bracer that was poking out from under his jacket sleeve, the snake on it seeming to look delighted, though he knew that it was a figment of his imagination.

He should take it off. Take it off and throw it away, or get it melted or something, but Harry didn’t want to and not only because Dumbledore had asked him to look after it. There was something about it, something special that made him rather protective of the golden item, even though he hadn’t heard anything about it before and neither, surprisingly, had Hermione.

Really, he thought, the one who he needed to speak with the most was Dumbledore. He had seemed to know what the bracer really was, even if he hadn’t given Harry any real information besides ‘look after it and it will look after you’. He would know what these blackouts were and how to stop them.

He had just finished his meal when there was a knock on his door.

Harry’s hand strayed to the pocket that held his wand as he approached the door, wary considering his experiences today. “Who is it?”

“A friend.” A bright voice informed him, one he knew rather well, “And her father.”

Harry opened the door to find Luna stood on the other side, long dirty blonde hair tucked up neatly and pinned in place by a golden decorative haircomb adorned by a serpent, a sharp contrast to her robe which was a garish combination of all of the colours of the Hogwarts houses in a zigzag pattern that left Harry dizzy after looking at it for too long.

“Mr Potter.” Mr Lovegood nodded to him as the pair entered the room, “I hear you need an escort for the day.”

“I don’t want to be a bother.” Harry tried, knowing that this could be one of his few opportunities to lose the Lovegoods before they were dragged into whatever he had gotten himself into.  

“No bother. No bother at all.” Mr Lovegood waved it off with a smile, “If a friend of Luna’s needs an escort, I’m more than willing to oblige. Xenophillius Lovegood,” The man offered Harry his right hand, “Nice to meet you.”

“Harry Potter. It’s nice to meet you too.” Harry nervously offered his own, before realising too late that the bracer was still showing. It didn’t matter too much. Mr Lovegood gained an odd look for a moment before shaking Harry’s hand briskly.  

“And now we’re acquainted shall we go?” Mr Lovegood asked, “I’m sure that you have lots of places you need to get to and our shopping list isn’t small either.”

“Actually I was just...” Harry trailed off as Luna latched onto his arm and pulled him out of the room and down the stairs, before heading towards the entrance to Diagon Alley. “Gringotts...”

“Well of course we’re stopping at the bank first.” Mr Lovegood informed him with a slight chuckle, “Can’t buy anything without money after all.”

Luna nodded briskly, still hanging onto Harry’s arm like a limpet. The boy thought he heard a comment about ‘Potter and Loony Lovegood’ from a couple of the students who were here with their parents on a trip , but he tried to ignore them. It wasn’t the first time he’d heard the insult after all.

He was surprised to feel Luna stiffen slightly and he touched one of her arms, unsure what to do to help her relax. It appeared to help though as Luna blinked at him and gained a smile as they stepped through the archway to the biggest wizarding high street in Britain


	3. A Muggle Game

Once through Harry almost forgot his problems. Having been escorted by Hagrid, who had had strict orders to get him everything on his list and then get him home and the Wealsey’s who had been herding their own mob and as such had had to run a tight schedule, he’d never really explored Diagon Alley properly before and he was astounded.

Of course the thing that stuck out most in his mind was the broom in the window of Quality Quidditch Supplies, the new one that was supposed to be better than anything before it. The Firebolt.

Oh how Harry wanted one, but he had a perfectly good Nimbus 2000 and there was no point buying a ridiculously expensive broomstick, especially when he would need that money much more when he was on the run.

There were Aurors visible all along Diagon Alley, but, to Harry’s surprise none of them seem particularly interested in him. There were several who stopped anyone wearing a hood that covered their face to show themselves and it took Harry a while but he finally realised that they weren’t looking for him. It wasn’t until he overheard a conversation between a particularly peeved shopper and a member of the police force patrolling the area however that he realised that they were, in fact, here for Sirius Black.

That was about the time that he realised that as he and Luna examined things in windows, Mr Lovegood was interviewing people on the street. Neither Auror nor civilian escaped as the man took page after page of notes.

“Luna?” Harry asked, startling the girl, who had had a farway look on her face, “Why’s your dad interviewing people?”

“Didn’t I tell you?” Luna asked, surprised, “My father runs the Quibbler. It’s a rival to the Daily Prophet.”

“Oh.” Harry blinked. He supposed that made sense. After all Muggles had seven or eight different newspapers, so he guessed there had to be more than one wizarding one, he’d just never heard of it before.

“I’ll let you see a few of our spare copies.” Luna promised with a smile as Mr Lovegood finished his latest interview and the three of them continued on their way, finally reaching Gringotts about half an hour after they’d left the pub.

The bank was packed. Busy goblins served stressed out wizards as everyone tried to get what they wanted immediately and though it wasn’t as hectic as it was during the last couple of weeks before term started when everyone tried to buy their school supplies, it was busy enough to hold Harry up a little longer than he would have liked.

Between the queues, the harsh attitudes of the goblins when they discovered that he didn’t have his key and they had to use a different method of telling if he really was Harry James Potter or not and his embarrassment at having forgotten that Mrs Weasley still had his vault key, though why she had it now instead of Hagrid was beyond him, Harry was just happy to get into the cart and take the short rollercoaster like ride down to his vault.

Once there Harry bagged up as much as he could carry, only making a small dent in the pile of gold there was staring him in the face. He wanted to take more but, in a worst case scenario it was there, safe in the vault, for if he needed it later on.

Luna, who had come down with him while her father had settled affairs at their vault, had been silent for a moment when the goblin had opened the vault but had then started babbling away happily, talking about something called dingbats, which Harry had thought was just a Muggle insult, but apparently, according to Luna, were creatures that infested vaults and fed on the gold.

The goblin with them seemed less than amused when Luna asked him if they had any living in their cave system, causing Harry to wonder if it was because of the implication that Harry’s gold wasn’t safe in the care of the goblins or if it was because they actually had some of them living there and had caught them feasting off the gold in the vaults. He also couldn’t help but wonder if the dragons that apparently guarded some of the vaults ate them as snacks.

Harry attempted to lose Luna again when they reached the surface again but didn’t get very far. A commotion at the doors about some kind of huge black dog, apparently called a Grim, let the Lovegoods catch up to him.

“Anyone would think you didn’t like us.” Mr Lovegood joked. Harry would have apologised and given some false statement about him being tired and maybe they could go shopping another day when Luna said something that made him pause in his tracks.

“Harry’s preoccupied with the fact the Aurors went to his house this morning daddy.” Luna informed her father, making Harry wonder what she knew already. Then confusion set in.

If they had already been to his house why wasn’t he under arrest already?

“Ah.” Xenophillius nodded as he escorted the pair out of the doors and ushered them towards Flourish and Blotts, “Quite understandable really. It’s never fun to have people turn up uninvited.”

Harry stared at the man for a moment as they stepped into the huge bookstore, wondering if they’d heard why the Aurors had shown up at his house yet and if he’d have been as easy around him if he had. 

“Come on Harry.” Luna took his hand and dragged him into the history section, where Harry spotted a copy of Hogwarts, A History, the book that Hermione had buried her nose into during their third year. Remembering how scary a peeved Hermione was and how ticked she’d been when all the copies of it had been booked out of the library last year he picked it up from the shelf before looking around for old books on magical artifacts, wondering if there was a book available that might tell him exactly what it was that he was wearing.

There were hundreds of books on artefacts and none of the ones he had time to go through before Luna and her father came looking for him had anything useful in them. Of course, he mused, after purchasing his copy of Hermione’s most read book as he sat down at a table at Fortescues with the Lovegoods with a rather large ice cream, it would help if he had a name to go on. Somehow he didn’t think that it would be easy to find anything on his bracer if he didn’t know that.

Luna finished her ice cream long before the two guys with her did and while Harry was fighting with his ice cream, trying to avoid losing half of it which was trying to fall off of the cone on the opposite side to him, she pulled a small box out of her bag and pulled out some playing cards. Except they weren’t like any cards Harry had seen before.

“What’re those?” Harry asked as Luna examined the cards in her hand carefully, took two out of the pile, put two from a second box into the pile, examining each of the cards carefully before doing so. Once he’d finished his ice cream and had washed his fingers, she passed a packet across the table to him.

“Duel Monsters.” She explained as Harry examined the packaging, wondering what kind of creature the animal depicted on it was, “It’s a Muggle game.”

Harry blinked at her, wondering why a pure blood girl who seemed like she wouldn’t be very comfortable in Muggle society would carry around cards from a Muggle game that most people probably hadn’t heard of.

“Go on.” Luna gestured to him when he didn’t open the packet, “I have plenty.”

Harry frowned slightly and opened the pack, tipping out the eleven cards inside and examining each one carefully. Luna moved her chair over so she could get a better look at what he was holding and explain about the cards as he went through them.

“That’s a monster card.” Luna informed him as Harry examined the first card out of the packet, a Silver Fang, “It’s a normal monster, you can tell that because it’s yellow. Effect monsters have an orange background and more information about their abilities in the box, instead of just a blurb.”

Harry just nodded, not quite sure what she meant by that.

“You see those stars right there?” She asked, pointing to the three stars in the corner of the card just under the black symbol in the corner which had the word ‘Earth’ written on it, “Those are its level. I’m not quite sure why they’re important right now, other than the more stars a monster has the more powerful it is.”

Again Harry nodded, pretending that he understood, after all if Luna didn’t understand the reason for them and she played the game, there was no way he would.

“The things you really want to pay attention to are this bit of text here,” She pointed just under the picture, “Which tells you what type of monster it is and these scores down here.” She pointed at the bottom right hand of the card. “These are Silver Fang’s attack and defence scores. They’re what determines what he can fight and defend against without dying.”

Harry actually understood that part and took in his Beast monster’s twelve hundred attack points and eight hundred defence points along with the fact it was a three star monster. “Is Silver Fang powerful?”

“It’s alright, but there are things much more powerful than Silver Fang out there.” Luna replied, as Harry continued to look through his cards which consisted of several monsters, and a couple of spells, which apparently had green backgrounds and informed the player of what they did in the text box.

Luna hummed as she looked them over, tutting slightly as she searched through the smaller pile of the two on her side of the table and offered a card to Harry. “Trade you my Rising Air Current for your De-Spell.”

Harry wasn’t even sure what Rising Air Current or De-Spell did, though the latter was pretty self explanatory, but he nodded and took the card in her hand in exchange for the De-Spell card in his small pile of cards.

“They’re not that expensive,” Luna informed him as she reorganised his small pile before handing it back to him. “I’d suggest you look in newsagents or comic shops.”

Harry blinked at her, confused but before he could say anything a pair of Aurors had come over to their table.


	4. Minster for Magic

“Mr Potter, we need you to come with us.”

Harry’s stomach flipped as he got to his feet, pocketing his cards, though he didn’t think that he’d be needing them much longer where he was going. “Thanks for today.” He nodded to the Lovegoods before following the rather solemn looking and constantly alert Aurors back to the Leaky Cauldron and of into one of the side rooms where Harry was shocked to see the Minister for Magic waiting for him.

“Sit down Harry.” Fudge spoke, indicating a seat by the fire, which was roaring away in the hearth.

Harry sat nervously, goosebumps rising on his arms. If this was about what had happened to Vernon, he was surprised that he wasn’t being escorted straight to Azkaban, unless they wanted to snap his wand first...

Fudge sat down in a chair opposite him and looked him over carefully before speaking, “I am Cornelius Fudge, Harry. I am the Minister for Magic.”

Harry knew that already but Fudge didn’t know that Harry had seen him arresting Hagrid, nor could he be allowed to know unless he wanted to get a large group of people into trouble.

Tom entered the room, carrying a tray of tea and crumpets, confusing Harry further. The innkeeper placed the food on the table and then left. The reassuring smile Tom had on his face didn’t help matters at all.

“Well Harry. You’ve had all of us in a bit of a panic.” Fudge told the very confused boy. Harry just stared at him, wondering why there wasn’t shouting and threatening and demands for him to hand over his wand, “Running away from your Aunt’s home like that! Thank goodness we had Aurors out already...”

“S...Sir?” Harry asked, too confused to know what else to say.

“I have a bit of bad news for you.” Fudge’s face turned grave, “Unfortunately we sent out an Accidental Magic Reversal team to deal with both your Uncle and your Cousin and none of them could do a thing to help them.”

Harry wasn’t sure if he should be happy or sad about that news.

“However we have had them taken into St. Mungos and placed on the Janus Thickly Ward, which is where those with long term spell damage are hosted during their recovery.”

There was something about Dudley and his Uncle being looked after in the same ward as Lockheart that amused Harry, though he still wasn’t quite sure what this was about since they didn’t seem too angry about his uncle’s unresponsive state.

“We are still talking to your aunt regarding you going back to her next summer. The woman seems quite certain you’re possessed or some such rot, but we can test for that easily enough and we did assure her that we’d keep a close eye on you while you were there, but I’m certain that she’s worrying about nothing. Accidental magic is understandable in a child, you just need to learn a bit better control.” Fudge paused for a moment, “Assuming it was accidental.”

Harry nodded, “I don’t even know how I did it.”

Fudge nodded at Harry’s not quite a lie. Harry could imagine that whatever he had done while he’d been ‘asleep’ he’d probably meant to do at the time, but he could honestly say that he had no clue how it had happened.

“So all that remains is to decide where you will stay for the rest of the summer.” Fudge said as he buttered one of the crumpets and took a big bite, “I suggest that you take a room here for the rest of the...”

“Hang on!” Harry blurted out, “You mean I’m not being punished?”

Fudge grew confused and Harry could practically see the Minister for Magic trying to put together what was going on. Then he  chuckled, “My dear boy, we’re not going to punish you for a couple of incidents of accidental magic,” He was gesticulating with both arms, the crumpet forgotten, “We don’t send people to Azkaban for defending themselves.”

Harry blinked at him, wondering what Fudge knew about his actions during his blackouts that he didn’t and was horribly tempted to ask. “But last year...”

Suddenly the amusement fled from Fudge’s face and fear replaced it, “Circumstances change Harry. We have to take into account the current climate...” In other words something had happened to change their attitude towards him, at least for now, and Harry had a feeling that it was something to do with the same Sirius Black that Tom had mentioned earlier. “Surely you don’t want to be expelled.”

Harry shook his head, more than happy to take advantage of the situation in order to remain out of jail and to keep his wand. “No, sir.”

“Then I don’t see what else there is to discuss.” Fudge got to his feet, “Now you understand, of course, that you can’t go wandering off into Muggle London,” Well there went his plan to get more cards, if only so he could understand what Luna was talking about, “Nor should you go wandering down Knockturn Alley. You’re much better and safer off wandering around Diagon...”

Where the Aurors could keep an eye on him was the unspoken ending to that sentence. Harry nodded of course. Anything to keep the Minister of Magic happy and him out of trouble after all and it was better than being sent straight back to the Dursleys where he could just imagine that his aunt would make his life a living hell.

Right up until she triggered a blackout at least...

“As regards to the charge of possession, Shacklebolt,” He gestured to the man next to the door who walked over, nodding to Harry as he did so, “Can test for that right now.”

“Afternoon, Mr Potter.” Shacklebolt spoke, “If you’d just take off anything magical that might mess with the readings and put them and your wand on the table.” Harry did just that, removing the bracer and dumping both his wand and it on the table, covered by his jacket, “Now just hold still for a moment. This won’t hurt in the least.” Harry couldn’t help the flinch that came when the Auror raised his wand and spoke so swiftly that Harry didn’t catch what he was saying.

A bolt of yellow light hit Harry’s chest and before he could say a word a glow suddenly appeared out of nowhere, surrounding him. Harry stared at his hand in shock and examined it, intrigued by the pale green light. It was obviously not normal as Shacklebolt looked rather surprised, but when it died down the Minister turned all of his attention on the Auror.

“So?” Fudge demanded.

“Clean. He’s not possessed.” Shacklebolt commented, still giving Harry an odd look. “B...”

“Good, good that settles that.” Fudge interrupted as Shacklebolt went to say something else, “I’d hate to have to send him through after all.”

“Definitely no need for that.” Whatever the Minister had meant by that seemed to knock the Auror back into ‘duty’ mode and Harry could practically see him snap back to attention. “He’s not possessed, so...”

“In that case,” Minister Fudge headed for the door, “I’ll just have a word with Tom and check there’s a room here for you.”

Harry pocketed his wand and was just slipping the bracer back on when Shacklebolt caught his arm. “Potter, a word?”

Harry didn’t have much choice in the matter but he nodded anyway.

“You’re not possessed but I would suggest you lay low for a while.” Shacklebolt informed him, “If they decide to test you again someone might not be as lenient as I was. That glow was supposed to be white. That it was partly another colour suggests that you have been possessed recently or have had soul to soul contact with someone. People don’t survive possession normally. You could land up in the Department of Mysteries as an experiment or worse. I don’t know what it means, but I’ve heard of the term ‘sending them through’ before and when I asked, I got told that the person in question was no longer alive so...”

Harry paled slightly at Shacklebolt’s words, “Thanks for the warning.”

Shacklebolt let him go and Harry finished adjusting the bracer, feeling slightly more secure when the snake on it tightened itself, securing the bracer on his arm.

Shacklebolt was giving it a curious look and was about to open his mouth to ask something when the Minister walked into the room looking rather pleased with himself.  

“It’s all settled. Room 11 will be yours for the rest of the summer.” Fudge grinned at him as Harry hastily shoved the arm with the bracer into his jacket sleeve, not wanting Fudge to see the golden item for an odd reason that he couldn’t quite explain besides ‘it felt like a bad idea’. “You’re to be back here before dark and Tom will be keeping an eye on you for me.”

Harry frowned, confused as to why Fudge was trying to keep him under his thumb when he hadn’t cared enough to look into Harry’s situation before. It was all because of Black, Harry was almost certain of that. “But...” Harry trailed off at the look on Fudge’s face. “Yes, Minister.”

“Good.” Fudge nodded, “Have a good summer Harry and try not to get into any more trouble. Remember if you have any problems the Aurors are around to protect the public, so don’t be afraid to ask.”

With that the Minister left, Shacklebolt nodding to him as he followed the Minister out, leaving Harry feeling rather irritated about the fact that he’d basically just been told to sit and stay by the Minister for Magic.


	5. She Knows the Truth

Harry hastily ate a couple of the crumpets and tried to work out what he was going to do. School didn’t start back until September and he basically had free rein on what he could do. Except he didn’t. He was basically confined to The Leaky Cauldron and the magical shops hidden beyond.

Tom was waiting for him when he left the room and the first thing the innkeeper did before he tidied up the room was show Harry to his room. The trunk and the owl cage he’d left behind the bar earlier were already in his room, while Hedwig, who he had let out of her cage when he’d left the Dursley’s, was preening on the perch just inside his window.

“Smart bird you have there, Mr Potter.” Tom said approvingly as Harry gave her a couple of owl treats and filled up the water bowl from the jug on the bedside table, “She flew in the window the moment I brought your stuff up.”

“Thank you for that by the way.” Harry nodded to the innkeeper who just smiled back at him and waved it off before heading downstairs, leaving Harry alone in his room.

The moment the door had shut Harry collapsed backwards onto the bed, not quite able to believe the way that his summer had changed in just a few short hours. Just this morning he’d had a list of chores to do, including mowing the lawn and it had been that list of chores, which Vernon had accused him of slacking on that had put into motion the events of today.

If it hadn’t been for the fact he’d had blackouts before today, he would have been convinced that he was going to wake up and find that today had been one hell of an insane dream, even the fact that he apparently had an escaped Death Eater after him kind of fit considering his past experiences.

Still there were pluses and minuses to the whole situation and he had had a reprieve from the Ministry when Shacklebolt had...

Harry paused, attempted to wrench the bracer off, had to pause while the snake uncoiled itself slightly, and then chucked it onto the bed, glaring at it.

The Auror had said he’d been possessed recently and the only thing that had changed in the last few weeks was the bracer. It all fit too. The blackouts, doing spells he would never have known about... It wasn’t that different from when Riddle’s diary and the spirit within had been possessing Ginny and made her attack the students.

Except while Ginny had been writing in the diary, Harry had been telling the spirit of the bracer nothing about himself, nor had he, hopefully, given him any openings. If anything Harry was surprised that the spirit appeared to be trying to help him. Every time he’d had a blackout it had been following pain, be it from a blow or hunger pangs.

Harry blinked as he realised this, sitting down on the bed and poking the golden bracer with a finger. “Who are you?” He asked it, wondering if it was another fragment of Voldemort’s soul, as the diary’s spirit had been or whether it was someone else who had sealed himself in his item for some strange reason.

Harry got no reply, not that he was really expecting one, and he spent a few more minutes glowering at the gaudy golden trinket. Somehow he had thought he’d feel relieved when he knew what the blackouts were but the knowledge he was being possessed didn’t ease his mind any.

Nor did he really know what to do. Dumbledore had told him to look after it, but Harry didn’t know if Dumbledore had known about the spirit within it. If he told his friends that the bracer was possessing him from time to time, Hermione would freak and demand he give it to a teacher, while Ron would probably want to destroy it or put it back where it came from.

Of course those were all perfectly justified things to do, or would have been if the spirit hadn’t been trying to help him. If there were just a way for Harry to talk to the spirit and tell him that while he appreciated the help he would really rather not get into trouble because he was being possessed by an over protective spirit who apparently thought that it was okay to drive people insane, it would be better.

Until he could find such a way, however, he was stuck trying to make sure he didn’t get hurt by anyone or anything, in case it triggered an episode.

Thinking about the spirit of the bracer made him think harder about what he was going to do over the summer. His best bet, he finally decided, was to make use of the huge bookstore on Diagon Alley, which might be able to help him work out what the bracer was and how to either remove the spirit from it or get in contact with his possessor.

If there was nothing in there there were other options, after all there were plenty of magical trinket shops around and, though he was loath to admit even thinking about using the last option, he was sure that Knockturn Alley had somewhere that could have information on it. Hell he’d been in Borgen and Burkes last year and seen the sorts of magical artifacts they had on offer. It was highly possible that he could take it to them and find out exactly what it was and why Dumbledore thought it was so important.

That, however, was most definitely a last chance option. He had no great urge to get lost down the dark, dank alley where dark magic lurked and there were plenty who would be willing to off ‘the Boy-Who-Lived’ for any reason, including that he looked at them in a funny tone of voice. 

Somehow he thought that while there might be some down there that might deserve whatever the spirit had done to Vernon and Dudley, and he was certain he should feel more guilty about that than he did, if people suddenly started turning up insane or worse he would be the first person the Aurors went to and they probably wouldn’t be as nice about it as Shacklebolt had been.

A knock on his door made him jump a mile. “Hello?”

“Harry?” Luna asked from the other side of the door.

Harry hastily opened the door, realising that Luna was quite possibly the only person he could talk about this with without sounding alarm bells in their head, and was surprised to find that Luna’s father wasn’t with her. “Where’s...”

“He went home.” Luna smiled at him, “Too many notes to write up to hang around all day having fun. I wanted to say hello before you left.”

Harry just nodded, knowing better than to question Luna on anything though he had had no intention of going anywhere until he’d worked out some sort of plan. “Hi. Come on in.”

Luna nodded gracefully at his welcome and entered the room, her eyes resting briefly on the rest of Harry’s things and a small smile forming at the sight of Hedwig, before coming to land on the bracer.

“I was right,” Luna breathed, except that Harry had this weird sense that the girl he was speaking to wasn’t Luna, which made no sense considering that it looked and sounded like his friend, “You do have one.”

“One what?” Harry asked, wondering what Luna meant by that.

“Serpent Item.” The girl stated matter of factly, closing the door behind Harry and waving her hand.

“What’s a Serpent Item?” Harry asked as a purple glow surrounded the door. “And what’s that for?”

“We won’t be heard now.” Luna stated matter of factly, “Now, you need to listen to me carefully. Over a thousand years ago, when Hogwarts was still young, the Muggle populace were terrified of witches and wizards and between their actions and those of others of our kind, the school became unsafe. So Salazar Slytherin, in an act of great love for the school he’d helped to build, used a tome translated from an Ancient Egyptian wizard’s text to create the five Serpent Items. One for each of the founders and a fifth, whose owner would be found in due time.”

Harry nodded his understanding of what she’d told him so far, “And this bracer’s one of them?”

“The five items are the Dagger, the Comb,” She gestured to the comb in her hair, “The Bracer,” She gestured to the item on the bed, “The Pendant and the Helm.

“This,” Harry held up the bracer, surprised, “Belonged to a Founder?”

“No. The Serpent Bracer was eventually claimed by one of the Teachers who worked under the Founders.” Luna shook her head, “The Comb belonged to Helga and was passed on to her female descendants. The Pendant was Rowena’s and it was a symbol of the knowledge and power in the school for many years before being squirreled away safely. The Helm belonged to Godric and vanished along with Salazar’s Dagger during the final battle between the pair and Salazar hid the Bracer after Powel, the man who held it, was killed protecting the school.”

Harry examined the golden bracer. It didn’t look that old. Considering that it had been down in the Chamber for thousands of years, he would have expected it to be dirtier, or damaged in some way. It was possible that whatever Salazar had done to make it a ‘Serpent Item’ had made it indestructible, supposed, but surely after all this time the enchantments on it would have worn off?

A thought hit him. Was it possible that the spirit of the Bracer was the teacher who had been killed while using it? Then another one hit him.

“Wait, you never told me what’s so special about these things or how they helped the Founders defend the school.” Harry informed Luna, shaking the bracer at her and trying to ignore the mental image of the spirit inside getting nauseous. “I mean...” Harry stopped at the strange look the other Item holder had on her face and put the Bracer back on.

“You don’t know very much about Voldemort’s reign, do you?” She asked after a few moments where silence ruled supreme.

Harry shook his head, wondering why she sounded so disappointed and why he felt so guilty.

“Tell you what.” Luna, her expression matching her tone, “You look into why we need to be very careful with these, and when you feel you know enough, write to me. I’ll know where you’re staying after all.”

With that Luna turned to leave.

Harry would never be quite sure what possessed him to blurt out the thing he said next, but before she could lower the spell on the door and exit the room, Harry asked, “Does yours possess you too?”

Luna stiffened and turned to look at him, as if examining him carefully, as if she wasn’t certain if he was suddenly going to bite. “You have blackouts?”

Harry nodded.

“Wake up having done things you don’t remember and couldn’t do if you tried?”

Harry nodded again.

“Sometimes in different locations?”

When Harry nodded a third time Luna frowned slightly, “I suppose if I did it then it’s possible he did too...”

“Luna?” Harry asked, trying to resist the urge to put the Bracer back on.

Luna’s eyes flickered from the Bracer to Harry’s face and back again then the girl let out a heavy sigh, “While you’re researching, see what you can find on Powel Redgrave. That might give you some more answers.” When Harry nodded for yet another time, Luna turned, dispelled the magic on the door and left, leaving Harry with more questions.

At least, he thought locked up and headed downstairs, he now knew what his bracer was. That it was a magical item made by Salazar Slytherin narrowed down the search radius quite considerably. There couldn’t be very many out there, at least he hoped there wasn’t. And even if there were there probably weren’t many that had been influential during the First War.


	6. Woof

Still slightly irritated over the fact that he was under surveillance, but grateful that he appeared to have gotten away without any repercussions for the spirit’s actions, Harry slipped into Diagon Alley again, heading straight for the bookstore where he swiftly got frustrated by the fact that there was absolutely no sense to the system that organised the books beyond ‘history’, ‘potions’, ‘transfiguration’ and so on and so forth.

In the end he had to ask one of the shop keepers, who had been about to ask him to leave as the store was closing and was more than willing to pile text book upon text book on him if it meant that he was going to leave. After all, as he joked to Harry as he added up the cost and took Harry’s money, not everyone could live on books alone.

Unfortunately there was nothing specifically on the Serpent Items available, though the clerk had promised to look as he had ushered Harry out of the store, but there had been a bit about Powel Redgrave in a book about the Founding of Hogwarts, and another bit about the items of power held by the four founders, and there was plenty available on Voldemort’s reign.

Carrying a magically enhanced bag that was designed to hold much more than it looked and had been offered to Harry at a discounted price when the clerk had realised that there was no way that they were getting all of Harry’s books into any less than four bags, Harry stepped back onto Diagon Alley a few hours later only to be surprised by the fact that the street was almost deserted as most of the shops had closed hours ago.

He sighed as he headed for the pub. Though he had plenty to read, it wasn’t going to be fun spending the next couple of months above a pub unless the rooms had spells that kept noise out, since if The Leaky Cauldron was anything like the Muggle pubs he’d often heard his uncle describing, it would get rather rowdy downstairs on the night times.

He was in the middle of making a mental note to write letters to his friends explaining where he was and half asking, half pleading with them to come and visit, when Harry was shocked out of his thoughts by a spell shooting past his cheek, the heat of it brushing his cheek as the spell narrowly missed its target and struck a wall, which exploded.

Immediately the two Aurors who had still been patrolling the streets, went into action, but by the time they’d acted the assailant, who had been hiding between two of the shops, was pinned down by a huge, messy furred dog who was growling ferociously and baring his teeth at the man, one of its legs pressing down firmly on the man’s wand arm.

“The dog yours, Potter?” One of the Aurors asked him, stopping him from retreating to the safety of the pub.

“Yes, he’s mine.” Harry replied, knowing the canine was nothing to do with him, but feeling a sense of loyalty to it, since it had, quite obviously, defended him and not wanting to know what the wizarding equivalent of a dog pound was like. Considering some of the magical creatures he’d met so far, it was possible the dog would get eaten while there.

The dog, whose fur was white and looked rather matted, barked and wagged its tail at the sound of Harry’s voice but didn’t move from its place on top of the man until the Auror who’d asked had physically shoved it aside.

In the split second between moving the dog and an Auror grabbing the attacker, the man on the ground vanished into thin air with a pop.

“Damn it. Apperated away.” The Auror growled, starting to cast spells a moment later in order to try and find clues.

“Are you alright Potter?” A second Auror asked, looking Harry over.

“That was a Reducto, you moron.” His partner informed him in the same tone someone would speak to a small child, “If it had hit him, you’d know about it.”

The second man scowled at his partner for a moment before turning back to Harry, “You need to get a collar on your dog.” The man paused and looked at the canine in question, “He’s covered in paint by the way, did you know?”

Harry had kind of guessed from the smell when the huge canine had stood up on its hind legs and, though it had looked thin, managed to knock him over before proceeding to lick his face, that the matted fur wasn’t a natural thing, but he had no idea how to get paint out of fur short of a long bath and... Harry paused as he realised where his train of thoughts was going.

The dog wasn’t his, it was someone else’s. It wasn’t his job to deal with the paint matted fur and even if it had been his dog he didn’t know if The Leaky Cauldron allowed pets besides owls.

“I’m hopeless with household magic.” The second Auror looked sheepish, “Or I’d clean him up for you.”

“It’s okay.” Harry waved it off as he pushed the canine away and got to his feet, “I’ll work something out.”

“Escort Potter and his pet back to the pub.” The first Auror told the second, “That might have been Black and he might try again.”

The dog growled at the sound of Black’s name and didn’t stop until Harry put his hand on the dog’s neck. Before he could really decide what he was going to do with the huge, furry menace he’d been walked back to the pub where Tom had taken one look at the Auror and ushered Harry upstairs, promising to bring food with him when he came up.

The barkeeper didn’t even say a word against it when the dog followed Harry upstairs, wagging its tail and panting happily. Hedwig didn’t like it though. She screeched at the dog repeatedly for a good five minutes before she settled down and even then Harry had had to promise her owl treats every day for the next month before she’d calmed down at all

Then had come the fun part of trying to remove rather thick white paint from rather unruly fur. It was very wet, very hard work as the dog, who had climbed into the bath without a whimper of complaint had decided for some strange reason that if he had to be wet, so did Harry.

When Tom came up, Harry requested a scrubbing brush or something from the kitchen. Tom did one better, not only did he bring up the requested brush, but he cast a pair of spells, one which removed all of the paint from the dog almost instantly, though it took several attempts, and one that set the brush to brushing the dog’s fur on its own without any input from Harry, allowing him to settle down and have his meal while the canine wolfed his down as if he hadn’t eaten in months and get straightened out.

Clean and brushed, the dog was actually quite a handsome animal. Harry had absolutely no clue what breed it was, but it had apparently adopted him and Tom had had nothing against the mutt staying here until Harry found his owner as long as it didn’t make a mess. “I wish I knew what your name was.” Harry told the dog, who was looking at him hopefully as he ate his dinner, begging for scraps off of the table. “They’re going to ask for it tomorrow when I pick up a collar and a leash...”

Harry trailed off as the dog appeared to glower at him at the words collar and leash.

“What? It’s the law... why am I talking to a dog like it can understand me?” Harry groaned at himself, “And I thought I was going crazy last year when I heard a giant snake in the walls...” The dog licked his hand and the same hand started scratching behind the dog’s ear automatically. “You’re not mine you know.”

The dog whimpered and leant against him.

“What? I’m only allowed to take one pet to Hogwarts and I already have an owl.” At the word owl, Hedwig hooted at him and Harry scooted across the room, done with his meal, and paid attention to her as well. “Feel up to taking some letters to my friends?” He asked the owl, who spread her wings in response as if to say ‘I’m ready to leave now’.

Harry chuckled and pulled a quill out of his bag, along with some spare parchment from his trunk and settled at the small table in the corner of the room. Hedwig landed on the back of the second chair, watching him write as the dog curled up at his feet.

It was surprisingly relaxing to have the two animals so close and by the time Harry had finished his letters and sent Hedwig off with them he had almost calmed down from the day’s scares. Though he still wanted to know who the man who had attacked him was. He couldn’t help but think that Black would have to be very stupid to enter Diagon Alley and attack him like he had so close to escaping from Azkaban.

It did make him realise something though. While he had hated the Dursleys he had been much safer there than he would have been if he’d been in the wizarding world before. If it hadn’t been for Black’s horrendous aim and the huge dog now snoring away happily it was quite possible that he would be dead.

Suddenly obeying the Minister’s request seemed like a very good idea. He had no illusions that the last two escapes from Voldemort had been anything but sheer dumb luck and he probably stood about as much chance against a Death Eater as food did against Ron.

At least here, in his room, the only people who knew exactly where he was were Tom, Fudge and Shacklebolt, and two of the people on that list he liked and though he didn’t know Tom well enough to trust him, the Auror had saved Harry’s life once already and as such the almost-teen felt like he could at least trust that he wouldn’t give Harry’s location away to someone who might want to kill him.

He wondered how the man had done that, teleported away like he had as he got changed and slumped onto the bed, putting his wand under his pillow as he had at the Dursleys, before he pulled one of his texts out of the magically expanded bag.

"Hey!” Harry protested as the huge canine clambered up onto the bed as he turned the first page and led across his legs, pinning him to the bed. “Get down.”

The dog gave him a mournful look.

“If you don’t get down I’ll give you an embarrassing name like Fluffy.” Harry scowled at it, figuring that if it was intelligent enough to understand him it was intelligent enough to have a sense of pride.

The dog shifted rather quickly at that, giving him a rather dirty look as it did so.

Harry just chuckled at it, trying to remind himself not to get too attached as someone would probably come forward for the dog before too long and then he’d have to hand it over to its owner. It was probably a good thing, he couldn’t imagine trying to explain to his friends why he was suddenly the proud owner of a huge, overly friendly, dog. Nor could he imagine trying to explain in a letter to Professor McGonagall why he had to bring two pets to school.

Harry fell asleep in the middle of reading a paragraph about how the school had been built using magic, might and sheer force of will against the wishes of the local populace and sleep right through the night, other than for a brief few minutes when Tom knocked on the door, wanting to collect Harry’s plate, and set the dog off.


	7. Research

The following morning Harry had a wash and headed downstairs to find Tom had a message for him.

“Ah, Mr Potter. I have some good news for you and some bad news.”

“Oh?” Harry asked, being careful not to lose his page as he settled at the bar, wand easily to hand in case of a repeat of yesterday’s events.

Tom nodded, “Which would you like first.”

“Good news please.” Harry informed him as he started looking over the menu, enjoying the fact that he wouldn’t have to cook breakfast for anyone for the first time in ages.

“That stray you brought in last night, I found out its name.”

“Oh?” Harry asked, surprised, “How?”

“That’s the bad news. Padfoot’s owner came in last night asking if anyone had found his dog.” Tom said, watching as Harry digested the name. When the pre-teen nodded, the barkeeper continued, “I mentioned that a lodger here had found him and that I’d be more than willing to bring him down if he, Grey he mentioned his name was, would wait just a few minutes. Grey told me not to bother.”

“What?” Harry demanded.

“Apparently Grey was just trying to make sure that the dog had actually found another owner. Apparently Padfoot has been trying to escape from him for the last few weeks and since Padfoot found him in the first place and appeared to be rather intelligent for a dog, he figured that he wanted to move on. Grey said something about ‘your turn’ and left before I could take down a way of getting in contact with him. Sorry.”

Harry just stared at him for a moment. “Wait.” He said, blinking at Tom, “Padfoot’s mine now?”

“Apparently.”

“Great. Just great.” Harry groaned, wondering what he was going to do with the massive canine during the school year. It wasn’t like he could send him back to his Aunt’s. After what the spirit of the Bracer had done, Harry could just see Aunt Petunia trying to poison the mutt. That was, of course, if the dog stayed there. If it was as prone to running away as ‘Grey’, whoever he had been, had told Tom he was, then Harry half expected Padfoot to be gone before Petunia had had the chance to kick him outside.

 Of course this did mean that Harry was going to have to ignore the Minster's advice on leaving Diagon Alley if the Magical Menagerie didn't have what he needed. Somehow the subject of dogs as pets had never come up amongst the students at school and he wasn't sure if the pet shop would cater to them.

It was the first thing he checked after breakfast after collecting Padfoot from his room and heading out, heading straight for the shop and trying to ignore the cries around him of 'the Grim!'

No wonder people didn't have dogs if others reacted to them like that. He didn't even know what a Grim was but it was enough to make him nervous.

Once in the shop he found that he had been right in thinking that he wouldn't find what he needed in there. Though they sold collars for cats, they had very little on sale for dogs and Harry found himself wondering where pure bloods got their dog food, if any pure bloods kept dogs at all. Somehow the thought of Lucius Malfoy taking a huge, scruffy dog like Padfoot for a walk seemed like a rather absurd idea. Perhaps one of those little handbag dogs that the rich and famous Muggles were so fond of but not a great big beast like the one that had adopted him.

The lack of ability to purchase what he needed brought up a real problem. He wasn't supposed to leave Diagon Alley, but he needed dog food and to get a collar for the canine. It was his responsibility as Padfoot's owner, however temporarily he might be filling that role. Though he could afford to pay whatever fine was levied against him, he didn't see the point of encouraging one when he could just as easily pick up what he needed.

The only problem with that was getting permission to leave. Since he wasn't apparently any safer in Diagon Alley then he was anywhere else, he was tempted to just leave and apologise later but considering the trouble he had almost been in he figured that he should probably tell someone where he was going first.

As such he informed the next Auror he saw.

Luckily the Auror he spoke to had spoken with one of the ones from the night before and he'd informed his colleague before escorting Harry to Gringotts to change some of his impressive stash of Galleons into Muggle currency, then through the pub, where Harry locked Padfoot in his room for the time being and the man changed into some surprisingly Muggle clothes before entering Muggle London.

Harry had absolutely no clue where to look for what he was looking for and ended up making a complete idiot of himself in front of the Auror, whose name was Andrew Savage, as the pair of them ended up wandering around and getting rather lost, ending up with Harry finally finding a pet store miles from their starting point.

He had, at least, found somewhere to buy the cards Luna had been showing him the previous day. 'Forbidden Planet' had been advertising the game of Duel Monsters in their window. Harry had popped in and picked up a 'starter deck' and a couple of boxes of the 'booster packs', shocking the clerk in the store with the amount he could afford on their way past and figuring that he could probably share the cards with his friends so he had someone to play against other than Luna.

Still it was several hours later when he and Savage finally returned to the Leaky Cauldron, by which point it was time to take Padfoot, who absolutely hated his new collar and lead with a passion, for a walk. Harry didn't enjoy that chore too much, but once he was done he could finally slump onto his bed and read without distraction.

Or that had been the plan before he'd started reading the rule book that had come with his starter deck and then he'd been distracted by that and the cards he'd bought until long after he'd had dinner. When he finally realised how distracted he'd been he pulled his book on the founding of Hogwarts over and started reading that again.

Powel's name came up, intriguing the boy. Apparently the wizard had been picked for his skills in transfigurative magics to teach the students and while the Founders had done most of the work in the school they had still required those with skill sets that were different to their own to teach what they couldn't.

This was fair enough, but Harry could just imagine the conversation that could possibly occur between the spirit of his Bracer and his Head of House. It would be an interesting one to say the least. Shame he wouldn't be aware of it at the time.

There was no mention of him wearing the Serpent Bracer, but there hadn't been a single mention of the golden items anywhere in the text so far which made Harry wonder if they had been omitted for a reason, or if they just hadn't been important enough for someone to put in. Either reason was viable. Things were left out of Muggle text books all the time for such reasons and he could imagine that the Serpent Items weren't as important as the creation of the school.

He changed his mind when he started on the book he'd picked up about Voldemort at the height of his reign.

Apparently before he'd even taken over Wizarding Britain, Voldemort had been a threat to be taken seriously because of his skills in magic, his control over strange shadow creatures and his oft used knack in Shadow Games that would kill, maim or steal the soul or sanity of anyone who dared challenge him and the two latter of that list were skills he had because of an item he had held, claiming that it was destined for him, called the Serpent Dagger.

Just seeing those words together made Harry frown, wondering if, considering that he'd found the Bracer in the Chamber of Secrets, Tom Riddle could have been searching for the Dagger down there and happened to find the giant snake that had been guarding the Chamber and set it on the other students or whether he'd stumbled across the Dagger in an act of sheer dumb luck, and had opened the Chamber of Secrets later.

A small part of Harry worried that if Powel's spirit was still attached to the Bracer, that Salazar was stuck inside Voldemort's Dagger much the same way. That was a rather terrifying thought.

Harry carried on reading, learning from the text book that Voldemort had used his Serpent Item many times over the years, using the powers it granted him and his ability to rally the purebloods to his side, with his demands for 'Blood Purity' to take over the Wizarding world in a short amount of time and though there had been many assassination attempts during the many years that Voldemort had been in power, and many who had fought against him, it hadn't been until Voldemort had tried to Avada Kedava a small child, aka him, that anyone had been able to stop the insane madman.

None of this was reassuring. He could, however, now see why Luna had wanted him to look up why he had to be so careful with the Bracer before she had told him anymore. The item could be dangerous.

Then he stumbled across something in the book that made him pause and look at the cards he'd left strewn across the table. There was a moving image on the page he'd happened to stop on that showed Voldemort directing an army of the 'shadow creatures' only to recognise one of the beasts he was directing as one of the monsters on one of the cards he'd picked up earlier that day.

On that note Harry put the cards away and put the book down, not awake enough to process the implications of that and went to sleep.


	8. Dog and Rat

The following day the answers still looked the same as they had the night before and Harry had to stop off at the post office since Hedwig hadn't come back yet in order to send Luna a letter before settling in to read more about the founders and try and find out something about the Serpent Items that didn't involve Voldemort and his apparently rather impressive collection of souls.

He didn't get very far before Hedwig was back with just one letter. Harry recognised Hermione's handwriting almost instantly, having 'read' i.e. copied her homework one too many times not to, and tore open the letter, wincing in anticipation of the lecture that was to come.

He wasn't that far off either. Though she started the letter with an rant about the stupidity of running away from home without letting either Ron or her know where he was going or what he was planning, she did trail off after a couple of hundred words and start answering the questions he'd thrown at her about if she was able to visit him at the Leaky Cauldron any time soon, if she’d made any progress on their search, which was a bit redundant now he’d found what he had, and how her summer had been in general.

Quickly sending Hedwig off with a reply, his musings about why Ron hadn’t sent a letter back were disturbed by the fact a knock at the door set Padfoot barking.

Harry grinned as the words ‘Blimey, do you think we’ve got the right door?’ filtered through as he calmed his dog and opened the door to find the Wealsey twins hovering on the other side of it.

“Hello Harry!” One of them grinned at him as the other eyed Padfoot warily.

“Nice dog.” The other spoke up, moving into the room cautiously.

“Thanks. His name’s Padfoot. His owner gave him to me.” Harry moved aside, becoming surprised when Padfoot stopped growling the moment the rest of the Weasleys were revealed and settled quite happily at his side. “I wasn’t expecting a visit.”

“You told Ron that you’re staying at the Leaky Cauldron over the summer,” Molly spoke as she entered the room, sweeping across it and pulling Harry into a hug, “How could we not visit?”

Harry stiffed for a moment in the hug, unused to bodily contact that didn’t precede pain, then relaxed slightly when he remembered that it was Mrs Weasley doing the hugging. It was enough for Molly to let go quickly though and she backed off slightly and looked him and his great big pile of books over. “Of course you could have come to us. The Knight Bus would have brought you right to our door.”

“Sorry.” Harry apologised, though even if he’d known about the Knight Bus before he’d been thrown out of the Weasley’s, he wouldn’t have gone there. Not until he could get his blackouts under control. He didn’t want to get injured by accident and suddenly wake up having attacked one of them.

“You alright Harry?” Ron asked, giving his friend a concerned look as he did so.

Harry just nodded, not wanting to bring up the fact that he was being possessed by the spirit of his Bracer in front of the rest of the Weasleys.

"I just can’t believe that those blasted Muggles kicked you out. Especially with Black on the...” Molly trailed off as if she’d said too much, but Harry already knew what she’d been about to say, after all Black had taken a pot shot at him the night before last.

“Is that why you got the dog?” Ginny, who was distracted by the big dog trying to lick her to death, as if to say ‘I’m not scary really’, asked as she stroked Padfoot’s fur.

“No. He found me.” Harry answered, trying to avoid another Molly Weasley type glomp by avoiding mention of the attack, “And his owner said I could keep him. He seems to like me and I think he’d great,” Harry couldn’t help but think that after the dog had possibly saved his life, “So I did.”

“He seems nice...” Ron hesitated to get close to the huge canine who reminded him rather too well of the Grims in horror stories.

“Harry, dear.” Molly interrupted the conversation, “You always have a bed at our house. Why don’t you come and stay with us? A pub is no place for a child to stay for any length of time after all...”

“I would, but Minister Fudge has already booked out the room for me for the summer and arranged for Aurors to stand guard.” Harry shook his head, hoping Molly wouldn’t push it. He really didn’t want to risk living with the Weasleys. He liked them too much to do that.

Molly’s face fell at Harry’s words. “Oh.” She considered him for a moment longer then smiled at him, “That doesn’t mean we can’t come and visit.” She informed him, secretly planning to see if she could convince Arthur to try and get Harry transferred into their home. “Now...”

“What’s this?” Fred or George asked, picking up the notes Harry had been making on the history of Hogwarts, “Ickle Harry doing his homework?”

“Give me that.” Harry snatched at the paper, not wanting to share his research outside of Ron, Hermione and Luna, only for it to be dangled out of reach. “Guys!” He complained.

Before anyone could say anything, Ron’s rat, Scabbers, had leapt from Ron’s pocket and gone running out of the open door. Padfoot, with a loud bark and a deep growl shot off after him, causing both Harry and Ron to run after them, both calling their pets back to them.

Neither paid any attention and Scabbers finally took cover in a cupboard, while Padfoot stood outside barking like mad.

“Padfoot!” Harry shouted over the noise, getting embarrassed by his dog’s actions and the looks he was getting from other residents at the inn, “Padfoot sit.”

The dog sat but kept growling and Harry had to get George’s help to pull the huge canine away from the cupboard so Ron could retrieve his rat.

“Sorry Ron. I don’t know what’s gotten into him.” Harry groaned as he shut the dog in his room and they gathered in the corridor, “He’s been so well behaved.”

Ron just glowered at the door and the dog that was growling like mad on the other side. “Well he better leave Scabbers alone. He’s not been well. We were going to get some medicine from the pet store.”

“I’ll get him to behave.” Harry promised, “Give me one minute.”

Harry slipped into his room, just about managing to stop Padfoot from escaping as he did so and locked the door behind him. “Padfoot sit.”

The dog growled at door once more and then sat, looking incredibly pissed off.

“Those are my friends out there.” Harry growled at Padfoot, worried that the Weasleys might not come back if his dog wanted to eat their pets, “And that was their rat. You can’t eat their rat.”

Padfoot growled at him in response.

“No.” Harry told the dog firmly, trying not to roll his eyes at the fact while Harry wasn’t saying anything that the dog didn’t want to hear Padfoot understood him perfectly. When it came to understanding a command not to do something however, the comprehension was very much lacking. Harry had thought it was just cats that had that issue, but obviously not. “No eating Scabbers. No hunting Scabbers and no chasing Scabbers.”

Padfoot whined at him.

“No. I don’t want you scaring the Weasleys off. I don’t have many friends and I don’t want to lose the ones I have. If you won’t leave Scabbers alone then I’m just going to have to send you back where you came from.”

That made the dog shut up hastily and Padfoot hung his head in shame, licking Harry apologetically as the boy attached leash to collar.

“I’m not really mad.” Harry promised the dog with a sigh, “I just...” Harry trailed off. Perhaps the problem was that he needed a day or two for everything to sink in. The last few days had been rather hectic and he hadn’t really stopped yet.

When Padfoot licked him again, Harry chuckled and ruffled the fur on the dog’s head.

“Come on then you monster.” Harry chuckled as he opened the door, holding tightly onto the lead, just in case Padfoot decided to make a break for it again. No such incident occurred though and by the time they reached Diagon Alley, Harry was almost certain that Padfoot had only chased Scabbers out of boredom. Scabbers had poked his head out of Ron’s pocket twice since then and though Padfoot had let out a low growl the one time he had seen the rat, he did seem to be behaving otherwise.

They made a stop at the pet store for some Rat Tonic, which looked to quite possibly be the most vile substance in existence from what Harry could see of it and then headed for Fortescue’s ice cream parlor where Harry treated everyone to an ice cream and tried to ignore the blush on Ginny’s face whenever he said even a word to the girl.

Obviously whatever he’d said or done while he’d been possessed by Powel down in the Chamber of Secrets had only increased the crush she had on him.

“Hey Ginny?” Harry asked when something occurred to him.

The girl jumped a mile and stared at him for a moment, as if internally squeezing over the fact that he’d started a conversation with her, “Y…Yes Harry?”  

“What do you know about Luna Lovegood?”

“Loon...” Ginny paused at the look on Harry’s face, remembering too late that Harry was friends with the girl in question and mentally wincing at her own stupidity. “Only what everyone knows.”

“Which is?” Harry asked, wondering if Luna’s Comb had shown some of its powers off yet, or whether Luna had much better control over her item than he did. 

“She talks to herself.” Ginny started listing things off, “She often spaces out. She doesn’t really hear what you’re saying and we’re half convinced she’s a Seer, because she often talks about things that haven’t happened yet but happen hours later.”

“The poor girl lost her mother a couple of years ago.” Molly spoke up, her face a picture of concern, “Selene was a lovely woman, a little... different, like her daughter, but sweet enough. Unfortunately she was prone to playing with potions and got herself caught up in some dark arts ritual that went wrong and well...” Molly sighed, “Xenophilius has to raise her on his own now so it’s no wonder she’s a little strange, what with all the nonsense he believes.”

Harry gave the woman a curious look, but Molly wasn’t willing to share any other information and Ginny had gone quiet so instead Harry got to listen to the Weasley twins talking about the upcoming rollover in the lottery that was apparently held by the Daily Prophet.

Harry hadn’t known about the lottery, but the twins were more than willing to share what they knew. Including the fact that the upcoming prize was a couple of thousand Galleons but they were too young to enter.

That hadn’t apparently, stopped their parents from entering multiple times. Harry supposed, though he didn’t know how it worked, that the more times you entered the more chances you had to win, but if that was the case, then there would be people who entered hundreds of times. It seemed a bit pointless to him.

Still he kept his mouth closed and listened to the twins rambling on about what they’d do with a couple of thousand Galleons, liking their idea of starting up a joke shop. He had been about to inform them of that and offer some of the ridiculous amounts of money in his account towards that goal when Molly had started ranting about how ridiculous the idea was that if Fred and George didn’t take their studies seriously, then they’d never amount to anything.

Harry, who honestly thought the twins were awesome and envied their pranking ability, was surprised to hear her lay into them so harshly but filed the thought about giving them some money away for a later date.

Once they’d all finished their ice cream, Harry had all but dragged Ron to see the new broomstick and they, along with the other Weasley children, drooled over the Firebolt in the window. Horribly tempted to buy one for each of them, Harry wondered how many of those he could afford and if it would clean out the rest of the gold in his account.

Before he could do something ridiculous with his money, Mrs Weasley ushered all of the children away, muttering something about the time and how they needed to be getting back. They parted ways at the fireplace, where Molly told him that he was welcome to visit any time even if it was at some absurd time of the morning, and that all he’d need to do was call for ‘The Burrow’ when he used the floo and he’d end up in their kitchen.

It was a nice thought, having somewhere that he could go if he needed to, and it left Harry buzzing a little as he headed back upstairs and back to his research. Hermione would have been proud as he went through the texts carefully, scouring them for information.


	9. Facts

There was a little on the razing of a village of Muggles, which had burned to the ground and left no survivors, killing around a hundred people in one of the texts on history around the time of the Founders, but there wasn’t much else on that subject and Harry dismissed it as frankly unimportant in favour of pouring over a mention of the golden Dagger Salazar Slytherin had been wielding in his battle with Godric Gryffindor.

There were no actual images of course. As there hadn’t been any cameras during the age of the Founders. There was, however, a copy of a painted picture, which depicted Slytherin with sword in one hand, Dagger in the other, locked in combat against Gryffindor, who had the more traditional shield and sword combination, and was wearing a golden helmet.

Harry took in the sight of the two items, knowing them to be two of the Serpent Items he had been researching and he quickly read the text, hoping to find something out about the pair. What he actually found was a rather bland section on how Gryffindor had lost all trust in Slytherin, discovered the incredibly dark magic he had been using behind the back of all the others and challenged him to a Shadow Duel.

Harry had no idea what a Shadow Duel was but it sounded important. However there wasn’t another mention of it in the entire rest of the book. Instead the book simply mentioned the fact that neither man had survived the Duel and gone on to mention how the last surviving Founder, Hufflepuff, worked to finish setting Hogwarts up, ready for her retirement and been found one morning in an everlasting sleep, just as her friend Ravenclaw had nearly five years previously. The last of the Founders died, while still sleeping three months later.

Harry frowned slightly, wondering what had happened to the Dagger and the Helm after the battle. He knew what had happened to the Comb. It had been passed on from generation to generation until eventually it had reached the hands of Luna. But he had no idea how the Dagger had fallen into the hands of Voldemort, nor did he have a single clue where the Helm had vanished to.

If the other items could survive this long, the Pendant and the Helm had to be around somewhere. Not that he wanted another Serpent Item. One ghost on a timeshare in his body was more than enough for him, but it would have been interesting to find out if they’d been destroyed somehow or if they were simply in someone’s vault for safe keeping or... there were hundreds of options, including that the pair were buried in some field somewhere, just waiting for archaeologists to dig them up.

Harry gave up on that book when it started on a completely different tangent and went back to his book on Voldemort, wondering if he’d find the term ‘Shadow Duel’ in there. It wasn’t but Harry hadn’t gotten too far before he’d realised he’d had a stupid moment and compared the things going on in the painted image of the ‘Shadow Duel’ and some of the things described in Voldemort’s Shadow Games.

They were exactly the same thing. The book on the last war had also, he realised, called them ‘Dark Games’ and ‘Dark Duels’. It was a lot of terms for exactly the same thing and it had thrown him but the evidence was right there, he just hadn’t seen it.

Looking at the possible effects of a Shadow Game made Harry realise something else too. He now knew exactly what had had happened to Vernon and Dudley and he didn’t think it was something that would be fixable no matter how much magic was poured into the problem. If he was right, Powel, while in control of his body, had challenged his relations to a Shadow Game and they had to have lost.

Part of Harry wanted to be sorry about it, wanted to feel guilty that his lack of ability to control the spirit of his item had resulted in the injury of his Uncle and his cousin, but he couldn’t. There had been one too many incidents over the years, one too many bruises for Harry to feel sympathetic towards them. Between that and the fact that Powel wasn’t prone to taking over and challenging people randomly, Harry couldn’t help but feel that perhaps whatever ‘Judgement’ or ‘Penalty’ Powel had inflicted had been justified.

Feeling a bit like he’d tried to cram too much for an exam, he took the night off, piling up his books on a table before spreading out on the floor with his cards, trying to ignore the fact niggling at the back of his mind that these same creatures had been the ones that Voldemort had been summoning during the last war to oppress the wizarding public. The game was Muggle. It was possible that it had been based on the creatures, especially if they had been on the news during the last war.

Working through the hundreds of cards in the box of boosters and with a rough knowledge of what he was doing, using the starter deck as a base, Harry slowly went through every last card, picking out the ones which appealed to him, which appeared to mostly be the Winged Beasts, and combining them with a few spell and trap cards, things like the Rising Air Current Luna had traded with him working well with the birds he’d picked out.

When he was finally happy with the forty cards in his deck he sorted the rest of his cards into piles dependant on type. Those piles he then sorted into name and attribute. He was almost finished with his pile of Fairy monsters when he realised he was procrastinating on deciding what he was going to do next.

He’d already sent a letter off to Luna, asking her for more information and explaining that he knew about Voldemort’s Shadow Games so that part of the decision was made for him. Luna had asked him to inform her when he’d known that much and he was curious about what more she could tell him.

Perhaps that was the best option. There wasn’t much he could do about what had happened before. Nor could he interact with the spirit of the Bracer. His best bet now was to go to the only other person he knew who held another Serpent Item, either that or Professor Dumbledore and he didn’t know how to reach the Headmaster during the holidays.

If he wanted it to be safe to go and visit the family who were more than willing to take him in, he needed her help. He just hoped she’d be willing to do something about the problem.


	10. Important Meetings

Another meal, another walk and another night’s sleep later Harry was just contemplating if he should carry his deck around like Luna did when the dirty blonde haired girl slipped into his room without a single warning, causing Padfoot to snarl at her.

A hiss and burst of golden light later, Padfoot was frozen in place.

“Harry, you have a not-a-dog in your room. Did you know?” She asked curiously as the dog let out a startled yelp.

“Huh?” Harry asked, confused, “Yes, I’m aware that Padfoot’s in the room. He’s mine. Padfoot Luna, Luna Padfoot. Please get on.”

“Huh.” Luna considered Padfoot for a moment longer, then suddenly Padfoot could move again. The dog barked at her sharply for a moment before hiding under the bed causing Harry to peer at the dog, worried. “I wouldn’t suggest transfiguration as a Penalty Game.” Luna commented as Harry straightened up, “It’s not really a fair way to punish someone since they can lose their mind in the form they’re trapped in.”

“Oh no. No no no.” Harry shook his head rapidly, “Padfoot’s not from one of my Penalty Games. I’ve never even...” Harry trailed off. “Wait, he’s human?”

“You didn’t know?” Luna asked, worried.

“I just thought he was a smart dog.” Harry shook his head, suddenly warier of the dog under his bed and moving away from him quickly.

“Maybe we should deal with him before we talk about important matters.” When Harry nodded in response Luna helped him to drag the dog out from under the bed.

“Take human form.” Something about Luna changed and suddenly she seemed a lot more regal than before, more like the way she’d acted when she’d spoken to him in his room before. For the first time he noticed that instead of the silvery grey eyes she’d had before, her eyes were now brown. “Now. Before I make you.”

Padfoot growled at her.

“Don’t test me, Padfoot.” Luna growled, “Unless you think you’re a match for my Item.”

The dog growled again.

“De-Spell.”

Harry missed the card between Luna’s fingers but he didn’t miss the way that Padfoot stiffened suddenly, nor could he look away as Padfoot went through a rather weird and painful looking transformation from four legged furry friend to the man Harry had seen on the posters of Sirius Black.

Before Sirius finished his transformation back to human form Harry had blacked out.

Luna glanced at Harry as the Bracer glowed and Harry’s black hair took on a browner tone, his eyes going amber.

“This one is yours, Powel.” Luna said, curtsying and gesturing to Sirius who had been frozen in place with a glower and a wave of the Bracer spirit’s hand. “But I want a word with you afterwards.”

“I understand Helga.” Powel nodded.

The spirit of the Serpent Comb blinked at him, surprised and then smiled at him and waved towards Sirius again.

“What’s going on here?” Sirius demanded.

“That’s what I should be asking you.” Powel glowered, “Pretending to be my host’s pet. I’m guessing that ‘Grey’ character was you too.”

“Your host?” Sirius’s eyes widened, “Who are you and what have you done to my Godson!?”

“Your Godson?” Powel demanded, “I think you gave up the right to call him that when you tried to kill him.”

“If you’ll remember I stopped that Death Eater from getting a second shot in.” Sirius shot back.

“Why would you stop one of your own allies fro...?”

“Me?” Allies with that!” Sirius looked severely offended, “How dare you?”

“You’re a Death Eater.” Powel pointed out, “A mass murderer who apparently wants my host dead. Why would I suspect otherwise.”

“I was never a Death Eater!” Sirius snarled at him, “Nor was I the one who killed all those Muggles! And Pettigrew is still alive!”

“Who?”

“The scum who betrayed Harry’s parents to Voldemort. He’s alive.”

“Where?”

“You think I went after that rat because I was bored?” Sirius demanded. “That was Pettigrew. He’s an Animagus. Like me. And he’s probably fled by now!”

Powel paused, grimaced and ran a hand down his face. “Scabbers? Is Pettigrew?”

Helga frowned slightly as she wondered why Powel suddenly looked like he wanted to throttle someone.

“That’s what I’m telling you.” Sirius snapped back.

“Damn it.” Powel growled.

“Who are you?” Sirius demanded of Powel, “And why are you possessing my Godson?”

“My name is Powel Redgrave. I’m a Master of Transfiguration and a Teacher at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.” Powel replied, standing straighter as he spoke, “And I’m possessing your Godson because he’s wearing my item and I’m stuck in it.” Powel paused, “Oh don’t worry. He’s unharmed. If he takes my Bracer off, I can’t possess him.” He saw an idea forming in Sirius’s head, “Try and take it from Harry without his permission and I’ll Shadow Game you.”

Sirius had been active during the last war, he knew the horror stories, and though he glowered at the spirit in control of Harry’s body, he wasn’t stupid enough to risk doing more than that.

Powel considered the man in front of him, then let out an irritable noise that was somewhere between a sigh and a growl, releasing the spell he had petrifying the man.

It took Sirius a moment to realise that he could move again and when he did, he sat down on one of the chairs. “So what are you going to do now?”

“What do you mean?”

“You can’t keep possessing my Godson. You could kill him.” Sirius pointed out.

“Wrong, actually.” Helga spoke up, interfering in the conversation for the first time, “What kills the host is the suppression of their soul when a second one moves into the body. We don’t live in their bodies, we live in our items and when we need to take control, it’s the True Self who enters the item. There’s never two of us in the body at the same time.”

Sirius blinked at her, “So this,” He gestured towards the pair of them, “Is harmless?”

“Relatively.” Helga looked less than concerned, “I’ve been doing this for over a thousand years and the only harm that’s ever come to a host due to my actions is when I ran into someone else’s Shadow Game while trying to talk some sense into them.”

Sirius didn’t look completely reassured. In his situation neither spirit could imagine that they’d be much better.

“You need to speak to my host, but I would suggest that you spend most of your time in canine form.” Powel told Sirius. “There are Aurors all over Diagon looking for you and I doubt you want to be taken back to Azkaban.”

“You’re on my side?” Sirius looked surprised.

“Too much of what you said makes sense.” Powel scowled, “But if you try anything that harms my host and you will regret it.”

“Why are you so protective of him?” Sirius wanted to know, “Is it just because you need his body?”

“Yes and no. The Serpent Bracer was mine, I got myself killed and sealed within it.” There was embarrassment there, and frustration, “Now it belongs to your Godson. I’d rather the same didn’t happen to him. It’s not a good way to spend a thousand years.”

“What happened during that battle?” Helga asked, watching Powel with concern, “You should have been able to handle that mob easily.”

“I don’t remember.” Powel admitted heavily, “The last thing I remember is talking with Salazar before we parted ways and then,” He sighed, “Nothing. I have no memory of how I was sealed, nor do I remember what happened during the fight.” Helga frowned slightly but Powel looked at Sirius. “I will answer any questions you may have at another time, but now, if you don’t mind, I have an old friend to catch up with.”

Sirius just nodded, trying to process exactly what he’d been told as the former Transfiguration professor turned to one of the women who had been his boss when he’d been alive.

“Madam Hufflepuff, please excuse my earlier failure to follow protocol.” Powel bowed to the woman currently in control of Luna’s body, “It is good to see another of our time.”

“I would say the same except that you have been foolish, Redgrave.” Helga scolded him, “I understand the need to protect your host. I have looked after many before my current holder inherited my Item. But you are more idiotic than I realised if you believe that you can keep using the Penalties you have.”

“I cannot lift the Penalties I’ve set,” Powel scowled at her, having not expected the lecture for what was, in his opinion, a fully justified challenge and Penalty, “Nor would I do so if I could. Vernon and Dudley Dursley...”

“I understand. I was thinking about doing something about his situation myself.” Helga held up a hand as she spoke, “But this time is not like our own. If it gets out that you are possessing him, they will send him through Rowena’s Veil.”

With that the spirit in control of Harry’s body froze, a look of disgust and anger on his features. “They would not...”

“You know the dangers of the Shadow Realm, Powel. Just as I do. Do you really want to risk your host’s life?”

“But he’s a child.” Powel’s growl mollified Sirius’s concerns about if Powel was really protective of Harry because he was worried about the boy, or just because he needed a body, but only slightly.

“That won’t matter to them. People without Items don’t survive possession, so to the Ministry they’re already classed as dead and... well... you know what walking through Rowena’s Veil is like...”

Indeed Powel did. The Veil had been designed by Ravenclaw as an easy method of getting back out of the Shadow Realm. A permanent gate that had taken the powers of all five Serpent Items to create and fix so nothing could escape. After a scare where they’d nearly lost Helga because she’d drained herself too heavily and not had the power left to escape the grasp the Shadows had had on her, it had seemed like a good idea. The Items were drawn to the Gate and, in the Shadows, the reverse was true.

That the Ministry for Magic was using it to feed the Shadows with souls whenever they discovered someone who was possessed was worrying.

“You need to stop and think about what you’re doing.” Helga spoke again when she saw that her words had almost sunk in, “I have waited over a decade for someone other than Slytherin to emerge.” Powel frowned slightly when Helga said Slytherin, catching the combination of hurt, anger and shame, “It would be nice for you to be around longer than a few days.”

Powel scowled but nodded. “I’ll be a little more careful.”

“Good.” Helga looked pleased, then suddenly it wasn’t Helga anymore, it was Luna who grinned at Powel and settled on the bed.

“Can Harry come out to play now?” She asked, giving Powel a sweet and innocent look.

Powel just snorted, amused by Luna’s complete lack of concern, and closed his eyes. Sirius watched in shock as Harry’s hair returned to its normal raven black colour and, when Harry opened his eyes and looked around, panicked, until he saw Luna unharmed and waving happily at him, the dog animagus saw that Harry’s eyes were green again.

“It’s an illusion.” Luna explained, “They do it subconsciously. Helga trained herself not to though so she normally only does it if she’s cross or trying to make a point.”

Harry just blinked at her, then turned to face Black, his eyes widening for a moment as he went for his wand, then confusion crossing his face as he realised something.

“You’re not in a coma.”

“No.” Sirius replied, looking amused at the total confusion on Harry’s face, “I don’t appear to be.”

“You’re not insane either.”

“No more than usual.”

Harry just stared at him for a moment longer then lowered his wand. “If you’re not insane or worse, then you either won or you got away without one, which means you didn’t attack me which means... You’re not trying to kill me?”

“Worked it out faster than your tenant.” Sirius snorted, amused.

“My... you met Powel?” Harry asked, pausing for a moment before pulling himself back on track. “If you don’t want to kill me why does everyone think you do? Aren’t you a Death Eater?”

“Because I was an idiot and no.” The last was said so firmly that Harry winced slightly, “I was never a Death Eater, but I made the mistake of trusting one, as did your parents. Now.” Sirius straightened slightly, not wanting to have the same conversation twice, “As your Godfather it’s my job to look after you, so I think I’m going to stick around for a while as your pet.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re apparently a trouble magnet and I can’t walk around on two legs.” Sirius chuckled, “Disguise charms only go so far after all. Besides, everyone thinks you have a dog now, so it’s a good cover.”

Harry couldn’t deny that fact. “So you’re really not trying to kill me?”

“No.” Sirius looked less amused this time, “Or do you not remember the guy who attacked you a couple of days ago?”

“People kept telling me that was you.” Harry defended himself, “Besides, I don’t remember anything after I felt the spell go past.”

Sirius grumbled something about ‘Powel not Harry’ and then shrugged, “It doesn’t matter. Now, if you don’t mind, I want a nap.” With that Sirius took dog form again and curled up under the table and went to sleep. Harry stared at him for a moment, trying to work out how Sirius was in clothes when he took human form, but had his collar when a dog then shrugged and turned to Luna. 

“I was hoping you could help me with something...”

“Helga’s already spoken to Powel.” Luna smiled at him, “So don’t worry. Unless he forgets he’s not going to get you chucked out of reality.”

“Chucked out of...” Harry trailed off, deciding that since it was Luna he probably wasn’t going to understand everything that came out of her mouth and the faster he understood that and worked around the fact the better.

Luna got off the bed and scooped something up off of the floor. Harry recognised it as one of the cards that he’d missed when he’d been collecting up his small army of Duel Monsters cards.

“You didn’t get this one from me.” Luna commented, showing his the Shining Friendship card that she’d picked up.

“No, I went into London and found Forbidden Planet. Then I bought almost all their stock...”

“It’s nice to have that sort of money in the Muggle world.” Luna nodded, amused by Harry’s embarrassment. “Do you have a deck built or would you like some help?”

“I have one built from cards that seem to like me. It’s untested though.”

Harry recognised the look Luna got. It was very similar to the one Ron gained when someone suggested a game of chess and he couldn’t help but be amused.

Several hours later he was in a rather different frame of mind as while he’d put up a decent challenge, Luna had squashed him six of the eight times they’d played against each other.

“It was the Ludios.” Luna patted his hand consolingly as she shuffled her deck and slipped it into her box, “They were stealing all your luck.”

“Maybe.” Harry let out a soft sigh and nodded, shuffling his bird cards and putting them away.

Luna got up and dusted herself off before offering Harry a hand to his feet. “You did well for your first time.” She informed him with an oddly serious look on her face. “Same time tomorrow?”

“Sure.” Harry nodded, surprised that Luna was willing to spend so much time with him, “I mean unless you have something you need to...”

Luna gave him a patient look, “I’m Loony Lovegood, remember?”

Harry did and then he felt a little guilty about thinking that Luna might just be humouring him. After all, while he had Hermione and the Weasleys, Luna didn’t have anyone except him to talk to. “Sorry.”

Luna just waved it off with a smile. “It doesn’t matter.” She turned to leave but paused at the doors, “Actually you’re going to be busy tomorrow, and for a few weeks... See you on the train?”

“Huh?” Harry replied intelligently, not used to Luna’s predictions.

“Enjoy your trip. Make sure you take lots of photos.” Before Harry could get Luna to explain she was gone, slipping out the door.

“I swear,” Harry complained at Padfoot, “She picks when to be crazy.”

Sirius just barked his agreement on that one, wondering when his Godson would work out that it was a female trait.


	11. Winnings

“I’m not going anywhere.” Harry insisted, “Though if the spirit of the Bracer’s going to behave I might visit the Weasleys...” Still musing he stepped into the bathroom attached to his room, got undressed, dumping the Bracer on a high shelf, told Padfoot to stay in the main room and started having a bath, only to get interrupted by a knock on the door and the sound of Padfoot barking.

“One minute.” Harry yelled, wrapping his towel around him and pulling on a robe, grateful that they were rather covering as he opened to door to an assortment of Weasleys at the door with huge grins on their faces. “Uh. Hi?”

Before he could get another word in edgeways, he had been glomped by a rather overenthusiastic Ginny, who swiftly realised he was soggy and not wearing anything under the robes and let go, blushing bright red.

“Not that I mind the invasion.” Harry spoke, just as tomato like as Ginny, “But I was kind of in the middle of a bath.”

“I apologise Harry.” Arthur said as he entered the room,  “But the kids wanted to share the news and I was hoping to extend an invitation.”

“News?” Harry asked, his hand on Padfoot’s collar as he watched Ron’s wriggling pocket, surprised that his friend had brought the rat back here after the last little episode.

“We won the lottery.” Ron grinned, “Us. The Wealseys. We won.”

Harry blinked at him, “What?”

“The Daily Prophet’s lottery. You know, the grand prize rollover jackpot?” Fred asked, settling on Harry’s bed, “The one we were talking about the other day?”

The information finally sank into Harry’s head and he grinned at the family who had been looking out for him since he’d met them, “Really?”

“Uh huh.” Ron nodded, amused that his little sister had gone silent after her enthusiastic hug, “Three thousand Galleons. All for us. And...”

“And that’s where my offer comes in, Harry.” Arthur interrupted his son, “I know Molly’s extended an invitation to you to stay with us over the summer, but we’re planning on using the money to fund a holiday in Egypt and we were kind of hoping you’d join us.”

Harry stared at him. “Seriously?”

“Of course if you don’t want to, we understand but...”

“No, no, of course I’d like to come.” Harry shook his head, “I just...” Harry glanced at Padfoot, who licked his hand and nudged him towards the oldest Weasley, “I’d have to find someone to look after Padfoot for me and I don’t have a passport.”

“You only need to fill out a couple of forms to get assigned a magical passport,” Mr Weasley grinned, “Unlike Muggles we have ways of making sure you’re who you say you are and we’re not going for a week or so. I need to arrange cover for my shifts in work after all. Why don’t you take the opportunity to send a letter to Hermione or Luna and see if they’ll take your dog for the duration of the holiday?”

Harry paused for a moment, then decided he was going to ask Luna since she knew about Sirius, while Hermione had been told about Padfoot but didn’t know about the bigger issue.

“You’ll finally get to meet Bill.” Fred or George grinned at him, “He’s wicked. He works for Gringotts as a Curse Breaker, gets to explore all sorts of ruins and tombs in Egypt. He’s got this awesome earring and...”

“And your mother will murder you if you even think about getting one like it.” Arthur told the twins, who looked like they were sulking. Harry knew better. If he was right they were probably scheming ways to get one without angering their mother.

“So where do I get a passport and how much do I need to pay?” 

“I picked up the paperwork on my way out.” Arthur grinned at him and handing it over, “We need passports too after all. And don’t worry. We have it covered.”

“But...” Harry started to protest, thinking of how much money was in his vault and how little money the Weasleys had.

“Now don’t go thinking that we shouldn’t be spending the prize money on you.” Arthur chuckled, interrupting Harry before he could get going, “We’re using it to treat the family to something we wouldn’t normally get and you’re family.” Harry frowned slightly, confused, “I assure you, Molly decided that back before you stole the flying car.”

Both Harry and Ron grimaced at the mention of the damned car that was currently haunting the Forbidden Forest.

“If it helps, think of it as eleven years worth of Birthday presents.” Arthur suggested, “Since we missed your first eleven.”

Harry nodded, still shocked that they would be willing to take him along on their family holiday, and made a note to take plenty of money with him anyway, so he didn’t have to spend the Weasleys’ any more than necessary.

“Now, as much as you all want to talk plans I think we should probably leave Harry to his bath, don’t you?” Arthur asked his children. Ginny and Harry went bright red again, but Fred and George took a rather different route. They picked Harry up by his armpits and his legs, carried him into the bathroom and dropped him into the bath.

Harry surfaced, coughing up bubbly water, to find Padfoot sat on one of the twins, while Percy was lecturing the other.

“You stupid idiot, you could have killed him...” Harry listened, rather amused, as Percy laid into the twins, but stayed in the bath, not really wanting to climb out in wet clothes while he had company. “...Don’t you ever think about what you’re doing?”

“Lighten up Perce,” Fred spoke, having been identified by his brother halfway through the rant, “It was only a bit of fun.”

“Yeah,” George added from his position underneath Sirius, “After all we have to prank our brothers. It’s mandatory.”

Any irritation Harry felt at getting dunked was washed away at that. He liked Fred and George. He wouldn’t have been able to get through the second year quite so easily without their teasing, and that they liked him enough to go along with his inclusion into the family was a relief and a joy. 

Still he let the Weasleys see themselves out and quickly locked the door behind them, before darting back into the bathroom and his nice, luckily still warm, bath.


	12. Bookworm

Harry really was busy the next day. He refused to go on holiday looking like a tramp. He had a funny feeling that he wouldn’t get through customs if he looked like someone who had just rolled off of the street, so, without so much as a hello to any of the Aurors, he slipped back out into Muggle London, this time cheating and using the Knight Bus rather than going on foot, and purchased a whole new wardrobe as well as another box of cards, this time from the new set of boosters that had been released the day before.

When he finally got back to the Leaky Cauldron, he half expected to get an earful from whoever was supposed to be on duty, but the only complaints he had were from Sirius, who had not enjoyed the fact he’d been cooped up all day and wanted to stretch his legs, and from Hedwig who had brought yet another letter from Hermione, who was planning on visiting the next day if he wasn’t busy.

Harry sent a message back again, leaving Hedwig staring at him irritably, since she wanted a rest, and took Padfoot for a walk and then settled down with his purchases, organising his new clothes and sorting through the hundreds of new cards, making note of a few that Luna might like, simply enjoying the peace that came with having a few days away from Dursleys.

When Hermione arrived the next day however, that peace and quiet was shattered, at least for a little while as she ranted at him in person for not going to her or Ron when he had been kicked out of his house. Right up until Padfoot licked her hand. Then she was too engrossed in finding out where he’d gotten the dog and where he was planning on keeping it during term time and did he know how to look after it properly, and had he taken it to the vets yet?

Hermione’s questions only stopped when Harry presented her with the books he’d bought. The wizard swiftly wished he’d waited till after he’d introduced her to the game of Duel Monsters because she proceeded to skim through all of them. She did, however, come to the same conclusion he had about the Serpent Items, minus knowledge about Powel, in half the time it had taken him.

Then their conversation had taken a rather different route. Instead of ranting at him Hermione started fussing, worrying for her friend and what using and owning such a dangerous dark artefact could do. She did suggest that he got rid of it, much as she had before they’d left school for the summer, but bit her tongue when Harry reminded her that Dumbledore had stated that he should keep it with him at all times.

Harry got to watch, amused, as Hermione was torn between concern for her friend, anger that Harry should shrug off the danger so easily and confusion since she still wasn’t sure if Dumbledore was really looking out for Harry or not.

“You are going to be careful with it, aren’t you?” Hermione asked finally, biting her lower lip and watching her friend carefully, knowing him far too well to ask him to stay out of trouble.

“Of course.” Harry agreed, not particularly wanting to become known as the Boy-Who-Sealed-Souls, “Though you know what I’m like. I’ll try and be careful and end up getting eaten by a dragon or something...”

Hermione glowered at Harry’s nochatlent shrug. “Harry James Potter. If I find out that you’ve been playing with dragons, I’ll... I’ll...” She seized one of the pillows off of his bed and swatted him with it repeatedly.

Harry let out a yelp of shock, having never expected it from his bookworm of a friend and grabbed the other, counter attacking and the pillow war didn’t stop until next door complained that could whoever had let the herd of hippogriffs into the room please let them back out again.

Neither kid could resist dissolving into laughter the moment the door was shut behind the complainer.

“We sound nothing like a herd of hippogriffs.” Hermione stated as they pair of them calmed down, stroking the fur on Padfoot’s back. “There’s much less squawking and roaring for a start.”

“What’s a hippogriff?” Harry asked only to earn himself a despairing look from his friend.

“I swear Harry, you don’t read anything you don’t have to, do you?”

“I read all those books I showed you.” Harry stated a little defensively.

“Only because they had information about your Bracer in them.” Hermione pointed out, looking like the cat that’s gotten the cream as Harry couldn’t deny her point. “Otherwise you wouldn’t have even thought about going into Flourish and Blotts would you?”

“Maybe.” Harry grouched, wondering, once again, why Hermione was a Gryffindor when clearly her love of knowledge should have made her a Ravenclaw.

Hermione just let out a soft snort and leaned back, using her hands to support her as she stared at the ceiling. “Mum and Dad have gone into London. Made me promise to stay here and talk to you. I told them the Dursleys kicked you out and they asked me if you’d consider staying with them?”

Harry blinked, wondering where this had come from. Unlike Ron’s parents, Hermione’s barely knew him. Certainly not enough, in his opinion, to make an offer like that. “Why?”

Hermione chuckled at him softly, though the sound was a mixture of bitter and something Harry couldn’t quite catch. “You were my first real friend. My parents think that’s important.”

Harry stared at her. “You’re kidding? There was no one...?”

“I don’t know where you went to school but no one wants to be friends with the nerd.” Hermione snorted, “We tried a few schools, but it was always the same. The kids my age didn’t want to know me, and the kids in the year I was always placed in couldn’t stand that they had to deal with having a younger class member.”

“You got to skip years?” Harry asked, slightly envious since if he’d been jumped up a year, he would no longer have had to share lessons with his cousin Dudley. His envy vanished just moments later as he both envisioned the reactions of his Aunt and Uncle if he had been jumped up a year and pulled ahead of their precious ‘Duddykins’ and heard the soft snort that Hermione let out.

“It’s not as good as it sounds. It just means you take tests quicker. Have to change school faster and have more to unlearn when you go to Hogwarts.” Hermione sounded frustrated.

“Is that why you took every class you could when we picked our options?” Harry asked, curious.

“I’m bored in normal classes.” Hermione admitted, “And hopefully that much work will keep me occupied. I mean I probably won’t get accepted for all of them, not unless they can work out the schedules and that would be a nightmare. I’m sure Professor McGonagall has enough on her plate already without having to worry about reorganising all of our classes.”

Harry just nodded his agreement. Between her duties as Head of Gryffindor House, the fact she was Deputy Headmistress and all of her classes, he could well imagine that scheduling headaches were the last thing she needed. 

“Well, think you’ll have time to learn one more thing?” Harry asked. “I mean it’s for recreation, and that’s a necessary part of studying, isn’t it?”

“I might. It depends what it is.” Hermione looked curious. “It doesn’t have anything to do with broomsticks, does it?”

“No. No flying. A few things that could fly, but no flying ourselves.”

“Oh?” Hermione asked, curious now, “Do tell.”

“It’s called Duel Monsters and...”

“You’re not talking about the Muggle trading card game that’s been hovering around the edges of popularity for a couple of years?” Hermione asked, confused. “Where did you even learn about it?”

“Luna.” Harry replied simply with a small smile.

“Ah.” Hermione nodded in understanding. After all she’d learned that ‘Luna’ was a perfectly rational excuse for almost anything, “I have a few cards, but I never really got into the game.”

“Luna’s teaching me how to play.” Harry replied, “I have plenty of spare cards if you’re interested.”

Hermione was and they spent an enjoyable afternoon going through Harry’s cards and beating each other with their decks, Hermione favouring Spellcasters and sneak attacks over Harry’s favoured heads on rush attack policy.

Midway through their fourth test of Hermione’s deck a thought popped into Harry’s head.

“Hey Hermione?” Harry asked, curious about something.

“Hmm?” Hermione replied, almost as engrossed in her cards as she had been in the books earlier.

“What do you know about Egypt?”

The question threw Hermione, who looked up as him, confused. “Why?”

“Uh...” Suddenly Harry wished he hadn’t asked since he had no idea if the Weasleys had invited Hermione on their holiday. “Because Luna said these,” He held up the arm with the Bracer on, “Have a base in Egyptian magic and I was curious as to what you know.”

“Well I’ve never really looked into Egyptian forms of magic.” Hermione admitted, “Thought about it when Ron mentioned that his brother was a curse breaker for Gringotts, but never got around to it. I was a little busy trying to learn ahead. After all the Pure-Bloods have been around magic for much longer than we have and...” She looked a little embarrassed, “I might have been asking the upper years for book suggestions.” She paused at the look on Harry’s face, “Yes I know, I’m being a know-it-all.”

“No, no it’s not that.” Harry shook his head, though the thought had crossed his mind, “I’m just surprised that anyone was willing to give you a book list. I mean other than the Weasley twins none of the upper years seem to like us...”

Hermione chuckled slightly. “Oh believe me Harry, the upper year students from our house love you for your Quidditch skills and the fact you brought Gryffindor the house cup for the last two years running. But no, the ones who gave me the information I wanted were the Ravenclaws.”

“How?”

“They appreciate anyone trying to get ahead.” Hermione chuckled, “Keep wondering why I’m not a Claw too.”

“Why aren’t you a Ravenclaw if you’re so interested in learning?” Harry asked.

“Nearly was. The hat was torn between Gryffindor and Ravenclaw.” Hermione blushed, “I had to ask to be put in Gryffindor. Embarrassing huh?”

“No.” Harry thought about how he’d pleaded with the Sorting Hat not to be put into Slytherin. “Not really but why Gryffindor?”

“Well, the only people I knew I wanted to be Gryffindors.” Hermione blushed, “And I kind of hoped...” She mumbled the next bit but Harry grinned at her the same.

“Well considering how little people seem to spend time with others outside their own house. I’d say it’s a good thing, right?” The smile that grew on Hermione’s face was enough to tell Harry that had been the right thing to say, even if he wasn’t quite sure where it came from.

Hermione had to leave before their duel ended, having realised the time and needing to meet up with her parents who had agreed to come back for her after they went shopping in London. Harry saw her out and then took Padfoot for a walk, taking a slightly different route again as he successfully got himself lost down the various alleys that led away from the main shops, the ones that he was always taken to when he came to Diagon with his friends, and towards the little shops that had sprung up on the outskirts.


	13. Old Friends and Foes

He felt a little safer, taking a different route back to the pub every time as the only part of his walk that was predictable was the four or five yards he had to walk to enter the leaky Cauldron. Not that he seemed to have come under attack again since that one incident, causing him to wonder if it had been planned or if he’d just happened to have the bad luck to run into a drunk Death Eater.

At worst it might have been Lucius Malfoy. Harry hadn’t forgotten about the promise Draco’s father had made after he’d outed him as the man who had set the problems of last year into motion. He had a funny feeling that if Dobby hadn’t intervened when he had, either he wouldn’t be walking around or he’d have had another Penalty on his conscious.

Somehow he doubted he’d get away as lightly as he had over the Dursleys if the spirit of his Bracer had sent a member of a rich Pure-Blood family insane. Harry was under the impression that, considering how well Mr. Malfoy appeared to get on with a certain family, that the Weasleys wouldn’t be sorry if Powel had taken matters into his own hands and they probably wouldn’t have been the only ones.

When his stomach rumbled he headed back the way he’d come, finding his way by trying to recognise the shops he’d passed, all of whom had closed by the time he had finally hunted down Padfoot’s lead which had somehow ‘mysteriously’ ended up under the bed. He was a couple of alleys away from home when he overheard a conversation he probably shouldn’t have done.

“Give me one good reason why I should listen to anything you have to say.” The voice of someone Harry didn’t know but set Sirius’s tail wagging echoed around the corridor.

“I need your help.” The second voice, a panicked man’s voice, made Padfoot start growling and Harry had to dig his feet in to prevent the huge dog rushing around the corner, “Please, you’re the only one I could turn to.”

“You’re dead.” The first voice growled, deep and rough, a tone that was rather similar to Padfoot’s.

“Please Remus.” The second man begged, “I had to hide. Sirius had friends that would have been out to get me. I...”

“You had to hide for ten years, Peter?” Remus deadpanned.

“Just listen to me.” Peter pleaded, “Harry has a new pet. A dog...”

“Black?” Remus’s voice was suddenly sharp.

“I would recognise him anywhere.” Peter agreed, “Harry doesn’t know the danger he’s...”

The leash escaped Harry’s hands, leaving a rope burn behind as he lost control of his dog. Padfoot bounded around the corner, Harry milliseconds behind, and pounced on one of the men.

The other drew his wand, but Harry was faster and shot off the one useful thing he’d learnt in the school’s Dueling Club. “Expelliamus!”

The other man’s wand flew into Harry’s hand as the boy tried to pull his dog off of the ratty looking man who looked like he’d lost a lot a weight recently.

“Padfoot.” Harry pleaded, trying to ignore the fact the man whose wand he’d taken was storming over. “Padfoot down.”

“Move away from that dog.” The second man, Remus, demanded of Harry, “And give me my wand back.”

“He’s mine.” Harry growled, “And no.”

“You don’t know who...”  
  
“Sirius Black, my Godfather.” Harry shot back, “And my guardian.”

“He’s a dangerous criminal!” Remus protested.

“He saved my life.” Harry growled at him.

“He murdered thirteen Muggles and our friend Pe...”  
  
“I did not!” Sirius transformed back, seizing the back of Peter’s robes as the man tried to flee, “It was all Pe...”

The man in question transformed into a rat and scurried away into the darkness.

“Damn it!” Sirius snarled before shifting back into a dog and chasing after the escaped rat.

“Padfoot!”

“Black!”  
  
Harry and Remus darted after the pair but lost them in the dark alleys.

“Wand. Now.” Remus demanded of Harry.

“Promise you won’t attack Padfoot.” Harry shook his head, backing away from the thin, light brown haired man, his wand pointed at him.

“I swear I won’t attack Padfoot as long as he doesn’t attack either of us.” Remus swore.

The moment Harry handed Remus back his wand the man held it out on his hand, “Find Sirius Black.”

The wand hovered above his hand for a moment and then pointed in a rather specific direction.

Harry chased after Remus who followed his wand to find a rather angry dog that turned into an incredibly angry man.

“The bastard got away!” Sirius snarled, “That treacherous, lying, backstabbing rat!”

“Black.” Remus pointed his wand at the man, “I should kill you for betraying Lily and James.”

“What?” Harry yelped, stunned.

“It. Wasn’t. Me.” Sirius growled. “We swapped Secret Keepers. I was too obvious a choice. I should never have suggested Peter. When he heard what happened he fled and I hunted him down. The prick cut off his own toe and blew up half a street escaping.” Sirius snorted angrily, “I’ll swear it under Veratasirum if necessary.”  
  
“Why didn’t you..." Remus trailed off as he remembered the fact that the most they’d ever found of Pettigrew was his toe, “You thought I was the spy.”

“I’m sorry, my friend.” Sirius hung his head in shame, 

Remus considered Black for a few moments then lowered his wand. “We should have known that it would be the rat.”  
  
“Excuse me.” Harry spoke up when it became obvious that Remus wasn’t going to blast Sirius, “But who are you?”

“This Harry,” Sirius said with a grin, wrapping his arm around his friend and becoming amused when Remus pulled away, “Is Moony.”

“Remus Lupin.” Remus introduced himself while glowering at Sirius, “I was a friend of your parents.”

“Nice to meet you.” Harry nodded. He opened his mouth to say something else but stopped when the sound of people running down the alley.  Sirius swiftly transformed into his canine form before anyone could see him.

“What’s going on?” Harry recognised the man as the Auror who had helped him when he’d been attacked as Padfoot wandered up to Harry’s side. “Are you alright?” He asked Harry, who nodded.

“Sorry, my dog decided he was going to lick Mr Lupin to death and I had trouble pulling him off.” Harry apologised, “Sorry if the noise worried you.”

The Auror looked a little putout but didn’t say anything as he escorted the three of them back to the pub where Remus and Harry sat and had a meal, with Padfoot sat at Harry’s feet. Harry enjoyed a good meal and a conversation with an adult that actually seemed interested in what he had to say and seemed quite interested in things like his upcoming trip to Egypt.

Harry had the odd feeling that Remus wanted to do something drastic to the Dursleys after Harry had mentioned that they’d told him that his parents had died in a car crash and wisely kept back the rest of his upbringing. After all it didn’t matter if Vernon wasn’t going to recover from Powel’s Penalty Game.

Remus, in turn, explained that he’d been in the alleys because he had gotten a letter from a family friend who had wanted to meet up with him. He just hadn’t expected it to be who it had been. Not that they could report it to anyone. If they tried they’d just sound crazy. They needed proof which meant they needed the rat.

After the meal Remus told Harry to get in contact with him if he needed anything and suggested that he took Padfoot while Harry was in Egypt.  That way Harry’s friends wouldn’t suddenly have the huge canine dumped on them.

Of course what wasn’t said out loud was that none of his friends would be harbouring a wanted criminal either.

Harry sent Padfoot with Remus there and then, half making up his mind to pack up his stuff and go to the Weasleys. He was half hoping that Pettigrew had been stupid enough to go back to the one place he knew he could get food and water without having to forage for it or fight other rats. He seriously doubted anyone could be that stupid, but he could always hope.

He only hesitated to go and visit his friend only because sneaking into Muggle London was one thing, leaving London altogether was something else entirely. The matter was taken out of his hands when Mr Wealsey and a pair of Aurors knocked on his door just as he was packing up the last of his things.


	14. Triggering the Future

He waited just long enough to make sure that he hadn’t left any of his cards behind and the followed the trio to the fireplace and then, through the floo network to the Burrow where Molly hurried Harry upstairs to the room he was going to share with Ron for the rest of the summer.

When he’d commented during one of the many discussions about the upcoming holiday that Hermione was going to be envious, Mrs Weasley had looked rather embarrassed and admitted that she hadn’t thought to invite the girl along and unfortunately she didn’t think that there was time to adjust the plans now but she’d try. It would be good for Ginny, after all, if there was another girl on the trip.

Within a few hours Hermione was also staying at the Weasley house and between the pair of them, they managed to get Ron into the card game and between that and Molly’s continued attempts to keep Harry as close to the house as possible, Harry lost track of time over the next few days. While he didn’t see a sign of ‘Scabbers’ the whole time he was there, he did enjoy several games of Quidditch, get to help degnome the garden and enjoyed some of the best food he’d had all summer.

He was thankful for Hermione’s presence the morning they were rushed out of bed and out to the airport, where Mr Weasley found everything highly interesting and more than once Harry wondered how he was going to survive a prolonged stay in the Muggle world with the Weasleys when, for all their supposed love for Muggles, they were completely hopeless in the Muggle world.

If it hadn’t been for Harry and Hermione’s combined efforts, the Weasley twins would have ended up being left behind because they irritated the security, Mr Weasley would have been so fascinated by the check in desks that he wouldn’t have made through security, yet alone gotten to the right gate.

Soon enough though they touched down in Egypt and checked into their hotel, one of the many in the wizarding section of Cairo. He and Ron got the pleasure of sharing a hotel room on the third floor of a surprisingly Muggle hotel, while Percy and the twins took over the room on one side of them and the girls got the other. The parents on the other hand, were up a floor and across the hotel.

“Bill will be joining us tomorrow.” Mr Weasley said as they gathered in the hotel’s atrium after settling all their stuff, “And he’s going to take us on a tour of the local area, so I thought, since we all have a little spending money, we’d explore the bazaar.”

“Awesome!” The twins grinned at each other.

“Before we go anywhere you’re to take this,” Arthur handed each of them a pair of sweets. “They’re called Babel Bombs. They come in different flavours and each flavour teaches a different language. We’ll take two, Arabic and Ancient Egyptian.”

To Harry the ‘Babel Bombs’ kind of looked like gobstoppers, but he put the first in his mouth and sucked on it, enjoying the spicy flavour and wondering when it was supposed to take effect. He only worked out that it had, and had been the Arabic Babel Bomb when the sign on the wall, which until then had been in what looked like squiggly lines suddenly became legible words in his mind.

“Do Not Feed the Crocodiles.”

“Wow.” Hermione looked delighted, not that Harry was surprised. This opened up whole new opportunities for Hermione to learn, and as he popped the other sweet into his mouth, he could already see his friend making a plan to hit every book stand she could find in the bazaar.

Ron, of course, looked rather bored by the whole situation, as he normally did when Harry and Hermione were introduced to something new. It was an example, Harry realised, of what Hermione had mentioned when they’d been playing Duel Monsters. Ron was a Pure Blood, he had been raised around magic, had seen it every single day growing up and had probably seen it do much greater things than create such trivial things as Babel Bombs.

As they left the hotel and wandered down the street, Harry wondered when and how he should share the information that he’d gathered on the Serpent Bracer with his friend. Hermione, of course, had read the books and worked it out for herself, but Harry knew full well that Ron would never do such a thing. Trying to get Ron to read his text books was bad enough, getting him to read anything extra without bribery involved would be impossible, especially on his holiday.

Plus Harry had a horrible feeling that even if Harry swore he wasn’t going to use the item’s powers, Ron would either instantly condemn the Serpent Bracer as a dark magical artefact and start shunning Harry, or he would see the powerful golden item and want it for himself. Harry didn’t want to believe it of Ron, but something in the back of his mind kept offering that as an option and Harry had learned to listen to his instincts.

Still he had to tell Ron about his findings sooner or later and sooner was probably the better option.

In fact he was going to tell Ron the moment that they split up, Ginny going with her parents, the twins and Percy wandering off, probably to split up further along, once they were certain their parents weren’t watching, and Harry and his two friends sticking together to explore, except he was distracted almost instantly by a voice he recognised. A voice that really really shouldn’t have been in Egypt.

“You like that bike then?”

Harry wanted to groan and complain but he had to keep the fact that his godfather was in Egypt a secret, as it was he headed towards the voice, only to find Sirius chatting away happily to a surprisingly pale Egyptian boy whose hair was almost white, about the motorcycles in a magazine.

“Harry.” Sirius, and it was obviously Sirius even with his changed hair and eye colour, grinned and waved when he spotted him, “I wondered when I was going to run into you.”

“Mr Grey.” Harry nodded back, unable to avoid the irritation that seeped into his voice, “I thought you’d cancelled your flight.”

“You know him Harry?” Ron asked, confused since he’d never met the man before and though Harry could recognise his Godfather, the fact he’d shaved and tidied his hair up, along with the grin on his face made him different enough that Ron didn’t recognise the wanted criminal in front of him.

“Mr Grey was Padfoot’s previous owner.” Harry explained, noting the way the boy Sirius had been talking to seemed fascinated by the conversation, “We met in Diagon.”

“Marik, this is my friend Harry and I’m guessing his friends Ron and Hermione.” Sirius introduced the boy, Hermione and Ron nodding to the boy as Sirius mentioned their names, “Guys, this is Marik. He likes motorcycles.”

Hermione just rolled his eyes at that, but before she could ask Marik any more questions a black haired, just as pale skinned, girl popped out of the crowds looking exasperated. “Marik, we must be getting home. You know father will be cross if we’re not back in time.” She scolded the boy, who had gone slightly more pale at the mention of his father, before turning to the others, “I’m sorry but my brother and I must be going now.”

“But Isizu,” Marik complained, “I’ve just met them and he,” He pointed at Sirius, “Has a flying motorcycle.”

Isizu gave Sirius a sharp look, muttering something about it being ‘a bad idea to drag Marik to the magical bazaar’ under her breath and started to drag her brother off. Marik, of course, put the breaks on so Hermione, being the one with the most common sense made a suggestion.

“Why don’t we walk you home?” Hermione asked, wondering why Isizu seemed even more put off by that idea then she did the idea of Marik staying a little longer. “Then Mr Grey can tell Marik a bit more about his bike.” And she could listen. She was intrigued as to how he had gotten it to fly, considering that she’d never had a chance to see Mr Weasley’s car in action before Harry and Ron had crashed it into the Whomping Willow.

“No, no. That’s not necessary.” Ishizu seemed more shocked at Hermione’s response to Marik’s complaint than anything else and, “We really do need to get going and you wouldn’t want to rush past all the... hey!”

Ishizu’s tone of complaint made the man who had barged into her and caused Marik to go tumbling into Harry, causing them both to fall over and hit the ground hard, wheel around and glower at the group. “Yeah what?”

“You should apologise to the kids.” Mr Grey pointed out as Marik picked himself up and offered Harry a hand.

“For what?” The man, who was obviously on holiday as well since he didn’t fit in with the crowds and had none of the relaxed attitudes of the locals, sneered, “They walked into me.”

“They were stood still.” Sirius growled slightly.

“No, that’s not how I remember it.” The man snorted back, turning to leave when Marik put himself between the man and his route forward.

“Apologise to my sister.” Marik growled.

“Look kid, just move.” The man was less amused now and when Marik refused he took a swing at the boy, knocking him into one of the stalls.

That was quite enough for Sirius who seized the guy’s arm and wheeled him around to face him. There would have been a fight if Harry hadn’t put his hand on Sirius’s arm and shook his head.

“I have an idea.” Hermione shot Harry a sharp look and froze when she realised that Harry didn’t look very much like Harry anymore. The browner hair and amber eyes were disconcerting in her friend. “Why don’t we play a Game?”

“A game?” The man looked confused. “Why should I play a game with you?”

Ishizu watched Harry carefully as she realised she’d seen this before. Her father had used much the same sort of tone when referring to games while wielding the Millennium Rod. She quickly looked the boy over, wondering whether he held one of the remaining mystical items and only just caught a glimpse of gold at Harry’s wrist. 

“Because if you win, we’ll admit you were in the right. If you lose or refuse to play, we’ll report your attack on Marik to the Egyptian version of the Aurors.” Harry replied, except Sirius knew full damn well it wasn’t Harry anymore, it was Powel.

The man paused to consider it and then shrugged. There was little harm in it and if he lost he could always obliviate the group any way. “What’s the game?”

Powel pulled a pound coin out of his back pocket and flicked it up in the air.

“Heads or tails, best of three.” Powel stated confidently as the Shadows flickered and danced around the pair, touching, but not harming those who weren’t involved while testing the mental defences of the two players, poking for weaknesses. Luckily Powel had the advantage there. Though he had plenty of flaws that the Shadows could exploit if given the chance he had proved before that he wouldn’t cheat. He was almost certain his opponent would.

“That’s it?”  The man asked, looking highly amused by the ‘boy’s’ audacity.

“That’s it.” Powel nodded, offering the coin to the man who reminded him of another bully he’d had to deal with on the behalf of his host since awakening. “I’ll even let you flip, but the coin must land on the floor and you must call before you flip AND,” The emphasis on the word made the man look at him sharply, “You mustn’t use magic to help you win. Also you are not allowed to hurt me or any of my party and if you break the rules, you’ll suffer a Penalty.”

 The man nodded his understanding, wondering why the kid was even going through all of this considering it was all a game of chance.

“Heads.” He called, tossing the coin into the air milliseconds after he spoke. The coin flipped in midair, rotating again and again until it bounced off the floor, rotated one last time and landed heads up. “Ha.” He crowed, smirking at the kid who had challenged him, trying to work out whether the amber eyes were a trick of the light or the kid thought it was intimidating. “Give me a second and I’ll have this won.”

“You do know what you’re doing, don’t you?” Sirius asked Powel who just gave him an amused look as the man bent down to pick up the coin and toss it again, “I mean...”

“Don’t worry.” Powel murmured back, taking his eyes off of his opponent to reassure his host’s godfather, “I’ve been doing this since long before you were born.”

The spirit of the Bracer had a point, Sirius had to admit and he backed off slightly so the game could resume. At the end of the day it didn’t matter one way or the other and he had to wonder why Powel had gotten involved in a dispute that didn’t even really involve Harry except by accident.

The man Powel was playing against wasn’t concerned, in the critical few moments that the boy had taken his eyes off of his opponent the tourist had taken the opportunity to slip his wand into his sleeve, just in case it was needed.

“Heads again.” The man said, flipping the coin again and scowling as one of the uniformed policemen walked around the corner and started heading their way. This time the coin landed on tails.

“All even.” Powel stated with a small smirk, knowing that that it was the man’s lack of concentration that had cost him the round. Even with something as simple as luck the Shadows were forever testing the players. Though the Game had to be fair, at the end of the day the one with the strongest will was almost always the one who won the game. “One more round?”

The tourist hesitated as one of the merchants further down the row of stalls came out from behind his counter and started talking rapidly to the officer, gesticulating wildly towards the man.

The man scowled, realising that he’d wasted too much time humouring himself with the group and attempted to leave, only to find he couldn’t walk away from the coin on the ground.

“What have you done to me?” He demanded, drawing his wand and pointing it at Powel, who seemed to gain an eerie smirk.

“You cast a single spell you lose.” Powel merely pointed out calmly, seemingly unphased by the fact he had a wand pointed at him.

“I’m done with your game, freak.” The man snarled as the policeman left the vendor and headed for the man, looking rather irate, “I’m leaving.”

‘Freak’ was the wrong word to use around Powel, who had, thanks to Harry’s relatives, a rather negative view on it and the Ex-Teacher scowled. “You can’t leave until the game is played out. You only have to toss the coin once more. Or is that too hard for you?”

“Heads.” The man seized the coin, tossed it at Powel’s head and attempted to scarper. The coin hit Powel’s forehead, just above his right eye and bounced off to land on tails, but that wasn’t what everyone was watching. The moment the coin had impacted with his forehead, Powel’s scowl had darkened and his eyes had glowed with magic, along with a glowing serpent that settled upon Powel’s brow.

The man got less than two steps away before he was dragged down by shadowy hands and though he tried to get to his feet, he found that the most he could do was turn to face his accuser.

“You broke the rules.” Powel’s dark tone frightened Harry’s friends, who backed away slightly from the spirit possessing their friend, “And for that there’s a Penalty.”

“Wh...What?” The man demanded, fear obvious in his tone as he realised that his wand had gone flying when he’d been dragged down and he couldn’t move, “What are you talking about?”

“Penalty Game,” Powel didn’t pause to explain, raising his hand, fingers splayed out, magic surging around him, darkening the surrounding area, “Rectitude.”

Magic leapt from him to the man and then, just as quickly as it had appeared, the darkness was gone and the man was off, babbling at the officer of the law, apologising for and admitting to a list of deeds that ended with him having to return the amulet he’d stolen from the merchant’s stall and being escorted to the police station. 

“What the bloody hell was that?” Ron demanded, wheeling on his friend, who was looking rather irritable himself, green eyes scanning the area and taking in what was going on around them.

Sirius dragged the trio away from the scene of the Game and out of sight before turning to Harry with a frustrated grimace. “Was that really necessary?”

“Don’t blame me.” Harry protested, “Powel’s the one who took offence at the way he was treating Marik. Hey... where is Marik?” The four of them looked but Ishizu and Marik were nowhere in sight.


	15. Hotel Retreat

“You need to keep better tabs on your tenant.” Sirius growled at Harry the moment that they were certain that the pair of children had probably run off when Powel had started his Shadow Game.

“I’d love to.” Harry shot back, “Except I’m not awake when he is. I have absolutely no say in what he does.”

“Hey!” Ron interrupted, poking Harry as he did so, “What the hell’s going on? What tenant? And who the hell is Powel?”

Harry pulled away, worried that Ron getting in his face might trigger an ‘episode’. “Powel’s my tenant. He’s the ghost of a teacher who taught when the Founders were alive.”

“You’re possessed...” Hermione went pale at that, remembering all too well what had been said about the negative survival rate of those who where possessed.

“No, yes... It’s complicated.”

“Then uncomplicate it.” Ron growled at him, wondering if he was talking to Harry now or the mysterious Powel that apparently borrowed Harry’s body and challenged people to weird games.

“I can’t.” Harry retorted, “All I know is that this,” He held up his right arm and the sleeve fell down, revealing the Serpent Bracer, “Is mine. When I found it in the Chamber of Secrets, it became mine. Professor Dumbledore wants me to keep it too.”

“But it’s possessing you...” Hermione bit her lower lip.

“The guy who owned this before me, Powel Redgrave was...”

“I know him.” Hermione looked surprised by the name drop, “He was a Master of Transfiguration and one of the very first teachers the Founders ever hired for the school but he just disappears from the books after less than five years at the school.” She stared at the Bracer with a little more awe. Harry could almost see the cogs turning and her mind overflowing with all the questions she wanted to ask the ex-teacher.

“The guy who takes control of my body whenever I’m hurt or am too shocked to move,” Harry shot Sirius a withering look and got a cheeky grin in response, “Same guy. He got himself stuck in here somehow and when I put the Bracer on in the Chamber I somehow woke him up.”

“Bloody hell.” Ron’s articulate response made Harry smile slightly. It was going better so far than he had feared it would. Then his friend’s face darkened. “But if he’s possessing you, doesn’t that mean that you’re gunna die?”

“No actually.” Sirius said. “I confronted Powel on that matter myself, after all I don’t want my dog’s new owner to suddenly keel over and die. Apparently because Powel normally rests in the Bracer and Harry’s sent there every time Powel takes over his body, there’s no risk of the possession directly killing Harry.”

“Directly?” Harry wished Sirius hadn’t phrased it that way as his sharp friend stared at him, her concern obvious.

“You read the books, Hermione.” Harry pointed out. “What’s the one thing that the Serpent Items are well known for?”

“Shadow Games.” Hermione spoke softly realising what had just happened and what Sirius meant by what he’d said.

“Shadow what?” Ron asked, looking less amused and more confused by the second, “What just happened?”

“Shadow Games are one of the key powers of the Serpent Items.” Hermione explained, trying to remember exactly what she had read, “They allow the holder of the item to test their opponent and put them on trial for crimes they have committed. They’re also almost completely played in minds of the players. We only got to see it here because Harry went for an uncomplicated game that only required the use of the coin he had in his pocket.”

“Wasn’t me...”

“But if they’re _Shadow_ Games doesn’t that make them dark magic?” Ron spoke over Harry, ignoring his friend’s protest.

“In theory yes, but the Founders created and used the Serpent Items and other than Slytherin, none of them were dark were they?” Hermione pointed out, “Besides, Dumbledore told Harry to keep it and he wouldn’t allow a dark artefact in his school would he?”

She put it like it was a matter of fact, but Harry couldn’t help but remember that Riddle’s Diary had been floating around Hogwarts for almost a full school year before it had been destroyed down in the Chamber of Secrets.

It only reassured Ron slightly and he stared at Harry’s Bracer like it was going to unleash a demon on the planet as he nodded slightly, “So what about the spirit of the Bracer? I mean ghosts aren’t supposed to be bound to things. That’s what made You-Know-Who’s diary so dangerous.”

“Riddle’s Diary,” Harry spoke up and managed to wedge his way into the conversation, “Wasn’t like the Bracer. It wasn’t magical before hand and it worked in a completely different way. I mean Ginny remembers everything Riddle did while using her body, doesn’t she? I fall asleep the moment Powel takes control and vice versa. Plus Riddle was trying to get his own body by draining Ginny’s life force. Powel’s not tried anything like that...”

“Yet.” Hermione pointed out, not willing to trust the spirit of the Bracer yet, not until she knew a lot more about him, though her natural trust in authority made the fact Powel had been a teacher during the time of the Founders stick out in her mind, after all if the Founders had hired him he couldn’t have been all bad. “You haven’t had the Bracer anywhere near as long as Ginny had the diary. I think we should do more tests.” She considered Harry carefully, “Can you wake him up?”

Harry shook his head. “I don’t know how and I don’t think we should play with this while we’re over here. If something goes wrong, I don’t want to be stranded in Egypt.”

“Point.” Hermione considered the options carefully, “I’m just worried about waiting another fortnight to get any answers, I mean...”

“What could it hurt?” Ron asked finally, “I mean if it hasn’t done any harm so far, I doubt another couple of weeks is going to make much of a difference. I mean if we keep a close eye on Harry, just in case he goes weird again there shouldn’t be any more trouble right?”

None of them actually believed that. They were too prone to attracting trouble and two weeks was a substantial amount of time. Anything could happen.

Still it was that or spend the entire holiday trying to work out ways of attracting Powel’s attention and getting answers from him about his plans for the future. Not that Harry expected him to announce his evil schemes, if he had any, but Ron seemed to be of the mind that Powel would launch into a villainous monologue at any given moment.

“I’ve got to go.” Sirius said, interrupting what was bound to become a long and drawn out argument between the three friends, “It was nice seeing you again, Mr Potter.”

“Mr Grey.” Harry carefully kept his tone neutral, still a little mad that Sirius thought that following him to Egypt had been a good idea and that he would probably follow him around, making sure that he didn’t get into trouble. It was bad enough when his friends did it, he didn’t really want his Godfather doing it as well.

When Harry’s friends also said their farewells, Sirius slipped away into the slowly declining crowds and the Golden Trio darted around, not really getting a chance to look at everything properly but managing to pick up a few trinkets before the stalls closed during the heat of the day. Harry and his friends took the opportunity to stop in a cafe for lunch and let the worst of the heat die down, wasting their time by playing a couple of rounds of Duel Monsters, before they continued their shopping trip.

By the time it was over Hermione had managed to find a second hand book stall and gotten severely loaded down with new books. She had had to purchase bag to put them all in and had chosen a rather pretty, rather ornately beaded but rather expensive magically expanded bag, stating that she had needed a new school bag anyway because her Muggle one had been falling apart at the seams from all of the books and equipment she had put in it on a regular basis.

Ron had gone another route, ignoring all of the old, fascinating text books, magical artefacts and tourist trinkets, bar a little golden pyramid that had a spell on it for luck and good grades, along with a pendant that was supposed to keep Mummies away if you visited any tombs, and proceeded, despite the huge lunch he had had, to try almost every type of food there was available on the stalls.

Harry however was more curious than anything else and he spent more time browsing than he did purchasing. He shocked Hermione by picking up a couple of books on magic from the huge bookstore at the top of the market, mostly, he admitted, because he was curious about the Bracer and how it had come to be, and caused Ron to complain that he didn’t eat enough when he wouldn’t try more than a couple of the foods on offer.

It wasn’t until he got back to the hotel he realised how restrained he had been. Everyone else had bags of stuff and he had barely brought anything. Harry made a note to go back out before they headed back and buy presents for everyone.

“Honestly Harry,” Fred, who along with his brother had managed to find the Egyptian equivalent of a magical joke shop and had made friends with the traders inside, along with several purchases that would keep them occupied for hours until they reverse engineered the tricks and treats and worked out how to produce a more effective and amusing version of the item in question, “Take you abroad and you don’t treat yourself...”

Harry, who was under the impression that the twins would probably blow their spending money within the first few days, just shrugged. He’d been looking for something that mentioned Shadow Magic or caught his attention and though he’d picked up a few things, there just hadn’t been anything that caught his eye.  

If anything he’d been distracted all day because he thought he’d seen an Egyptian man with blank eyes wearing a turban following them around but hadn’t said anything because there were loads of them around. The only reason Harry thought he’d been following his group of friends was because the Bracer had grown warm every time the man had been close and it had been at a pretty constant, warm temperature all day although, Harry allowed, that could have been because of the heat.

He was glad he’d thought to pick up cool long sleeved clothing because even after they’d let the worst of the heat die away, it was still baking wandering the stalls and Harry was half convinced that he was going to find himself rather sunburnt when he woke up in the morning. Luckily Hermione had thought ahead. The moment that she’d agreed to come to Egypt with Harry and the Weasleys, she’d gone on a spending spree, buying very important things like sunscreen and aftersun, both of which she had used before leaving the hotel that morning, and a wide brimmed hat.

It looked a little silly, but Harry was envious of it later on in the evening when the aftersun he’d applied the moment they’d returned to the hotel did little for the soreness of his burnt neck and face.

“You look like a lobster.” Ron sniggered at him.

“Ummm, pots and kettles Ron.” Harry snorted back at him, amused, as he pointed at the window. The darkness outside caused the glass to reflect Ron back clearly and his red headed friend looked even more burnt than Harry did.

“Shut up Harry.” Ron let out a good natured but exasperated laugh, much the same way he had when Harry had chuckled when Ron’s broomstick had smacked him in the face during their first flying lesson with Madam Hooch.

“Well if the pair of you,” Hermione started in that tone of voice that Harry and Ron had come to know as Hermione’s ‘ha, ha I thought ahead and you didn’t’ tone of voice, “Didn’t think to buy something as simple as suntan lotion, I suppose I might be convinced to share to make sure that you don’t get burnt any worse than you already are...” 

“No need.” Arthur said, having picked some up at the airport at Hermione’s direction while Harry had been herding the twins away from the Duty Free shops where they had been tempted by some of Muggle electronic toys, mostly to see how much it would take to make them blow up. “I thought that Harry had some with him or I would have handed them this sooner.”

Harry let out a soft groan as Arthur passed a bottle out of his bag and it got passed down the line to him and Ron. Not that the pair of them were the only ones who had been burnt, Fred and George had caught the sun and Ginny’s face was a lovely shade of pink.

 “Don’t worry.” Arthur chuckled, “I managed to get a friend of ours to quickly brew up a few potions just in case this happened. They’re in our room. I’ll share them out before we go to bed but don’t take too much, we don’t have more than a couple each and they’re rather expensive to buy in tourist areas.”

They finished eating in the hotel’s dining hall and headed up to their rooms, Ron heading for his parents’ room in order to pick up the sunburn relief potions that would make tomorrow much more enjoyable, while Harry crashed out on the bed, dropping his wand on his bedside table and rolling his sleeve up, going to take the Bracer off only to realise that there was someone else in the room with him.

He scrambled to his feet, grabbing his wand as he did so, turning to face the same turbaned man that had been following him and his friends since Powel had Shadow Gamed that thief.


	16. Fragmented Soul

“Who are you?” Harry demanded, pointing his wand at the man, but unsure what to do considering he had never actually been taught an offensive spell that wasn’t for disarming his opponent.

The man didn’t answer, instead he just crossed the room, pointing an odd keylike item at his head.

“I’m warning you.” Harry backed up, trying to think of a single useful spell he had learnt in his years at Hogwarts and wondering why Defence Against the Dark Arts had never actually covered defensive magic.

The key touched Harry’s forehead and with a twist of the man’s wrist the key turned and Harry’s world went spinning away.

Powel had awakened the moment that the Shadows had activated against his host but there had been no time to do anything about it besides pull his host into his room and start towards the door to confront the intruder.

On the other side of Powel’s door, Shadi was stunned by what he was seeing. When entering a normal person’s mind, he would have landed straight in their soul room, which was the personification of what a person was. Everything that defined a person was in that room and it was easy to see what a person’s strengths and weaknesses were, just from what the room looked like and had in it.

The Millennium Key had, however, not led him to the Soul Room of the boy who he was testing, but to a corridor. A corridor that had not one, not two but three doors attached to it. One was an enlarged version of a door to a cupboard under the stairs, one was metal in origin but had a crest engraved on it that he had never seen before while the last door was bolted and padlocked so many times that it was a miracle that he could see the door beneath it.

That wasn’t anywhere near normal. Two doors would have suggested a split personality at best and possession at worst. Both he had dealt with in the past. Three, however, suggested that there was much more going on here than he knew and made him rather wary. After all the boy had held not one of the true Shadow Set, but an item of the secondary set, created by a wizard attempting to copy the power of the Millennium Items.

He moved towards the cupboard door and looked through the slats in the grate attached to it. The room on the other side was lit surprisingly well for the dark soul he had sensed earlier and he could make out the four poster bed on the other side of the room, it’s red and gold drapes offending his sense of propriety. He reached for the door handle, intending to enter and find out more about the boy before he decided what to do about him, only to turn around as the heavy metal door on the other side of the room swung open and a teenager stepped out, amber eyes glowing and very dark brown hair obvious.

This one, he realised, was the one he had watched challenge the thief to a Shadow Game and issue a Penalty.

“Are you here about the eviction?” The teen asked with a scowl, gesturing towards the bolted and padlocked door, “Because if you’re not I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

“And who are you?” Shadi asked, “And what gives you the right to demand the eviction of another, when you have no right to be here yourself.”

Powel laughed, irritating the Guardian of the Millennium Items, “I obviously have more right to be here then whoever lives on the other side of that door. I’m allowed to come and go when I please, whereas that door was sealed like that long before I got here. I doubt, if my host’s subconscious truly wanted me to stay in the Bracer, I would be any freer than them...”

Shadi’s eyebrows raised as the spirit in front of him trailed off, glowering at the other door as he did so, though that was the only sign of his emotions he allowed to be seen, “You take refuge in the mind of a child. That is a mark against you. That you use the powers of the false Shadow Set is ano...”

“False!” Powel spluttered, turning his glower on Shadi, “The Serpent Items are not fake!” Then he paused and considered Shadi properly, his tone taking on a low growl, “I know of your people. You are from that cult that attacked Salazar and attempted to wipe his mind clean of all thoughts.” Powel’s right hand went for the wand in his back pocket, “I would have thought that after a thousand years you lunatics would have died out.”

“Us? Die out?” Shadi asked, his tone revealing much more about his emotions than his, ever expressionless, face, “We have waited for over five thousand years for the Pharaoh’s return and while your mere copies jeopardised everything the Pharaoh gave his life for, we have stood the tests of time and fought against the likes of you.”

“The likes of me?” Powel asked, incredibly ill amused, “And what, pray tell, do you mean by that?”

Shadi was about to retort when he realised that he was allowing himself to get distracted. “I do not have time to converse with you.” The ancient spirit informed the much younger ghost, “Your actions today have long reaching consequences and I must correct them before the fallout is too great, starting with freeing this young one’s mind...”

Powel’s Bracer glowed as Shadi turned away from him, towards the locked door, unwilling to let this threatening stranger mess with the balance within his host’s mind, only for the spirit to get a shock as Shadi’s Key lit up brightly and he was sent crashing into his door. It slammed open under his weight and he went tumbling through it and into the room inside, landing on the floor hard as the door was pulled shut by an invisible hand.

By the time Powel had picked himself up, the Millennium Key was already doing its job, unlocking the mental defences that Harry’s subconscious mind had thrown up against the less welcome intruder, undoing over a decade of resistance in less time than it took Powel to get up and find that the door was stuck fast, trapping both himself and his host inside the Bracer.

With the spirit of the Bracer out of his way, Shadi planned on removing the second door that wasn’t supposed to be here, with plans of removing the foreign influence within before erasing the Bracer and any information about the Shadows from the room of the boy’s soul.

The last bolt on the door slid open and Shadi opened the door, only to have to step back to avoid a blast of corrupted air that leapt forth through the crack. The wind widened the gap between door and doorframe, the rancid stench of decay leaking into the corridor and offending Shadi’s senses, causing him to choke, though he had ceased to need to breathe thousands of years ago.

Shadi was left with little time to recover before a figure stepped out of the door and into the corridor that led out to Harry’s body. The being that the ancient tombkeeper spirit beheld was unlike anything he’d ever seen, a horrifying, twisted, malformed, mutilated child like creature that stumbled out into the corridor, its features twisted into a delighted and amused grin and when it spoke, there was a hissing behind its voice that meant something but Shadi wouldn’t tell what.

“Free at last...” The creature said, looking up and down the corridor before considering Shadi properly, “You’ve even emptied the body and provided a trio of Shadow Items for me...”

“You’re not welcome in this boy’s mind...”

“And yet you unbound me.” The creature snorted, interrupting Shadi before he could bluster on, “So either you’re a fool, or you’re seeking to turn this vessel into a mindless slave. So which is it?”

Shadi stared at the childlike wraith. He had never seen such a creature before, nor had he any idea on how such a monster could live in the child’s mind, for it certainly would not have the power to overwhelm the boy’s mind directly, though a two pronged attack from both it and the spirit of the Bracer would have worked.

Not that the Bracer spirit seemed inclined to share his host’s head space if the plans for an eviction were anything to go by.

“I am the Guardian of the Shadows until the Pharaoh’s return.” Shadi informed it, his eyes locking with the creature’s, staring it down and threatening it with his Millennium Key, which glowed brightly. “You will... what?”

Shadi looked around quickly as the creature vanished only to let out a sharp gasp of pain and hold his head as he staggered backwards, leaning heavily against the wall, his head pounding as it felt like fingers were tearing through his memories and soul, trying to find out everything.

 _‘A tomb keeper.’_ The creature sounded excited as its voice echoed at the back of Shadi’s mind, _‘Oh how I’ve waited to get my claws into one of you.’_

“Get out of my head!” Shadi demanded, realising he’d allowed himself to forget the most important thing about entering someone else’s mind. In the real world he was little more than a semi-corporeal shade, making him invulnerable. Here, however, he was just as vulnerable, if not more so as the people he was testing.

And he had let it in.

 _‘I remember you.’_ The voice continued, taunting the ghostly Tomb Keeper, who even as it spoke was trying to muster the powers of his items to repel the intruder, trying to prevent it from reaching any important information or worse accessing his semi-mortal form, _‘I remember how you tried to break my mind with your Shadow Games.’_ The voice turned vindictive, _‘I thought I destroyed you then... guess I’ll have to try a little harder.’_

The pain coursing through Shadi increased at those words and the spirit collapsed to his knees, trying to hold back the scream that tried to escape his throat.

 _‘Surrender,’_ The voice whispered to him, _‘Surrender and it’ll all be over. I might even let you keep part of your mind intact. Keep fighting me and well...’_

Shadi couldn’t prevent the panicked, agonised cry from erupting as it felt like something sharp pierced into the depths of his soul.

Inside Powel’s room the spirit of the Bracer heard the scream and froze momentarily. He’d known whatever was behind the locked door was bad for his host, he had been able to sense that much from the door even before he’d known about the extreme measures the boy’s soul had taken to protect itself from the other intruder.

“Wh...Who?” The sound of another voice made Powel wheel around and glower at the speaker, only to realise with a shock that his host had woken up and was staring at him.

A second cry broke the staring contest that had begun between Powel and his Other and the spirit of the Bracer snarled and tugged on the door again, angry that the intruder had basically handed over his host’s body to a malevolent spirit without a second thought. That he was now paying for it was slightly better, but considering that the end result would likely be that Powel and his host would remain trapped inside the Bracer while the other spirit, the one Powel had tried and failed to evict, did as he pleased, Powel was in an incredibly foul mood with the Egyptian man.

To the Ex-Teacher’s shock, the door opened, the spell holding it shut failing when Shadi had left the corridor, unable to focus on the spells in Harry’s head while he needed to turn all of his focus inward to prevent the creature he’d freed from the second room from destroying everything in his own mind.

Powel and Harry darted out of the door, Powel turning to his host, who was looking incredibly sleepy and had only woken up because of the agonised cries within his mind, and putting his hands on the boy’s shoulders. “Stay here. I’ll deal with this.”

Harry would have complained but the combination of shock at actually getting to meet his lodger face to face and the little voice at the back of his mind that told him to listen to someone for once before diving into danger. Instead he gave Powel a small, determined smile and said, “Let me help.”

Powel groaned slightly in his mind, having forgotten that the boy whose vessel he shared was almost as stubborn as Gryffindor himself, but didn’t let it show in front of the child, who was, at least reacting much better than Powel had thought he would.

There wasn’t time to argue, so Powel nodded his acquiescence but held up a hand before Harry could take control of his body, “I’ll go out, you can back me up from in here.”

Harry looked put out but he agreed to Powel’s terms and the Ex-Teacher, who only looked like a teen in the soul rooms due to being linked to the mind of a teenager, took control of their body, finding it strange to have his host’s thoughts running around in his head along with his own, though they weren’t as clear here as they were while Powel was in the corridor.

Shadi had backed away from Harry and dropped the Millennium Key as his mind fought with the presence that had stolen into Shadi’s mind using the bond created by the Milllennium Key, trying to expel it before it could take root and finding it difficult.

Powel tensed up when empty brown eyes took on a red glow and Shadi’s features seemed to blur slightly, becoming more serpent like.

“Finally.” The voice that spoke most definitely wasn’t Shadi’s and Powel felt Harry freeze, a weird sensation that threw the Shadow spirit for a moment until Harry realised what had happened and tried to calm down. Powel got the weird sensation that Harry was trying to tell him something but he couldn’t understand what the boy was saying. “What a stubborn fool. No matter, this body is mine now.”

Powel let out a soft growl as he realised why Harry had frozen. He recognised that voice. It was older but it was practically the same as the voice of the boy whose basilisk he had fought in the Chamber of Secrets, the boy who had called himself Lord Voldemort.

Powel tried to move between Voldemort and the Millennium Key but unlike the Transfiguration Master who was still getting used to being a scrawny teen again, Voldemort’s host could just ghost through whatever objects he chose and proceeded to do just that, beating Powel to the Shadow Item easily.

Powel backed off quickly, Bracer glowing as he prepared for a battle between his Bracer and the items held by the spirit controlling Shadi, only to realise at the same time as the other spirit that the Millennium Items were refusing to work for Voldemort.

“Why?” Voldemort protested, glowering at the items in question as if giving them the most powerful death glare he could muster would make the ancient artefacts behave. “This is my body! That means these are my items!”

“But they’re not.” Powel had to choke back his amusement, “Because you’re trying to steal them.”

“What?” Voldemort turned that same death glare on Powel who felt his host recoil slightly but held the body in place, “Explain yourself.”

“You can’t just take control of someone and expect their Shadow Items to work for you.”  Powel practically crowed, “You have to defeat them to take control of their items and seizing control of someone doesn’t count! As long as you’re in that body you won’t be able to challenge him. Those items will never be yours! And...” He held up the arm with the Bracer on, the serpent on which was glowing, “I challenge you to a Shadow Game. You win you can take this.”

He felt Harry’s shock but stayed strong. He knew exactly what he was doing. He could still sense the creature’s link to his young self’s mind and wanted to sever it forever. While the creature had been firmly entwined in Harry’s mental defences it had been impossible to get rid of it, but now he had this chance, this one chance and he was willing to stake the Bracer on it.

“Oh really?” Now Voldemort looked intrigued, “You’d be willing to stake your Bracer on a game you can’t win?”

“Oh I’ll win.” Powel retorted, “And when I do, you’re done.” Powel drew his thumb across his throat.

Voldemort looked even more amused than he had previously at that little statement. “I can’t die. I’m not truly alive.”

Powel just smirked at him, “Is that a refusal?”

“Of course not.” Voldemort snorted, ill amused that Powel considered him cowardly enough to run away when such a powerful artefact was on the line, “But once this is all over, all you’re going to be able to do, Bracer spirit, is watch from your imprisonment in the Bracer as I break your little host apart piece by piece.”

Powel growled as he called the Shadows forward, trapping the pair of them in a world that only they could see, borrowing an idea he’d seen in his host’s memories to create a giant chess board which formed with the two players in place of the Kings.

“Unoriginal.” The part of Voldemort currently resting inside the Guardian of the Millennium Items snorted, unimpressed by the game before him. At least until the pieces not only came to life, but the knight’s horses leapt off of their pedestals, which faded from the scene before the horses’ hooves hit the ground, and the other pieces started talking amongst themselves as they stepped off of their platforms and onto the board.

“Slightly more impressive.” Voldemort corrected himself as he took in the pieces around him which seemed to be acting fearful towards him, while Powel’s pieces were guarding the young man stood amongst the black pieces.

“You have first move, Voldemort. Just remember that this is a Shadow Game, if you attack me you’ll pay the price.” Powel said with a slight growl in his tone, feeling weird putting the dark lord in charge of the white pieces considering the modern day attitude towards darkness being evil, while light was good. There had been no such nonsense in his day, but his host’s thoughts and feelings had begun tainting his own from the moment that he had started using Harry’s body as his own and looking through Harry’s memories and that was how the boy had been taught.

Once Powel had managed to finally have a proper conversation with the boy for more than a few moments he planned on making sure that Harry started to understand shades of grey much better but until that time he had to work with what he had.

Voldemort, amused that the spirit of the Bracer, who had less right to be in Harry’s mind then he did, had the audacity to challenge him, ordered a pawn forward two spaces and, trembling as it did so, the pawn walked forward.

"Your turn, ghost.” Voldemort sneered. Powel didn’t rise to it. Much better people had come up with much better insults over the years and ‘ghost’ wasn’t even an insult coming from a warped creature like the one in control of the intruder’s form. He would much rather be a ghost than a twisted wreck of a soul.

Not that Powel was certain that what he was facing was a full soul. Not from what he had sensed every time he had stumbled past the creature’s door on his way back to bed and especially considering the fact that Powel had already run into a fragment of the soul he was supposedly fighting, the quarter soul that had been bound to the diary had been a threat and it had only, supposedly, recently learnt of the powers of the Serpent Items, unlike this fragment in front of him.

As he directed the pawn opposite the one Voldemort had moved, he wondered just how many ways Voldemort had split his soul, for it was possible that the person in front of him was just an eighth of Voldemort’s soul or less. If it was then obviously Shadi was pathetic or had incredibly low mental defences, for it should never have been able to take control of a strong, healthy mind.

“I have a name.” Powel informed the spirit who was considering his next move, “See if you can work it out.”

Voldemort ordered one of his knights forward, the blue armoured knight on the back of his huge purple horse leapt over the heads of the pieces in front of it and landed on the right square.

“I don’t need to work it out.” Voldemort said, beginning to feel woozy and cursing his lack of a Shadow Item that would willingly work for him, “You come from the Bracer and you have to be the rightful owner of a Shadow Item for it to work for you. Other than Potter only one person has ever held it.” He gestured for Powel to continue his move as he spoke, “That same person was found soulless after a battle involving the Blood Mages that the Founders had so much trouble with.”

Powel blinked at him, confused, then informed the Bishop on his right hand side that he wanted him to move. “How do you know that?” Powel demanded, confused considering that there was no way anyone living would have remembered that long ago.

“This isn’t the first time I’ve run into a Shadow Spirit.” Voldemort’s reply shocked both host and spirit, and the pair stared at the spirit of the Dark Lord with identical expressions of surprise.  “I’ve met two of the Founders.”

Suddenly Powel felt concern from his young host. It took him a moment to realise why but then it hit him. Luna carried a Serpent Item, inside of which was the spirit of Helga Hufflepuff, and Luna was Harry’s friend.

“Which two?” Powel asked carefully, surprised by his own concern for Harry’s friend.

“Hufflepuff,” Voldemort answered, “Who was possessing Lovegood’s wife...” And that made more sense than him having a run in with Luna considering that the Dark Lord had been dead over a decade, long before Luna had inherited the Serpent Comb, “And the Greatest of the Hogwarts Four, Salazar Slytherin.”

If Powel had ever needed proof that the boy in the Chamber was the same person as the spirit now possessing Shadi, that was it. ‘The Greatest of the Hogwarts Four’ had been said in exactly the same way, in exactly the same tone. That wasn’t what Powel wanted to know.

“How?” He asked as the two players took turns moving their pieces, with Powel castling himself at the first available opportunity.

“Hufflepuff and her precious host challenged me during the war. I won but Hufflepuff left her host an out that allowed her to escape with the Comb. Once I’m done with you that will be my next stop.” Voldemort snapped, finding it harder and harder to resist the pull of the Shadows, with every breath feeling like he was walking on nails and every thought slow, like his mind was trying to drag them out of a lake.

With Voldemort struggling to concentrate on the game, Powel was in a position to win in just three more turns. This was a relief to the spirit of the Bracer, who was tired from his earlier game and was finding it difficult to keep his guard up the entire time even though he was expecting Voldemort to try and cheat any second. 

“And Slytherin?” Powel asked as he moved one of his pieces into position, “Check by the way.”

Voldemort glowered at the black queen, who was glaring back at him and moved one square backwards, putting himself out of check.

Powel chuckled, having expected it, and moved another piece into position. “Check again.”

Voldemort glowered as he looked around, his head pounding and his body about ready to give up on him, realising that he was caught. He couldn’t move without putting himself in check except to one square and if he moved there the next turn it would be checkmate.

There was one answer though. The host he had taken had picked up the wand of the man that Powel had gamed earlier and that same wand was sat in his back pocket.

He drew it and pointed it at the spirit of the Bracer, casting before the other player could react.

“Avada Kedava!”

Powel started moving far too late, but luckily for both him and Harry, the Pawn whose square was in front of him threw himself in the way, protecting the ‘King’ from attack just as it was supposed.

Powel drew Harry’s wand, the Game’s magic already shifting and turning against the one who had broken the rules as the white pieces retreated and the black ones turned on Voldemort, drawing weapons and give Voldemort looks that would have killed him if it had been possible for looks to kill.

“You cheated.” Powel growled, the Bracer glowing and the golden serpent resting on his brow once more as the Shadow practically begged to be allowed to feast on the soul of the cheat. Powel saw no reason not to allow them to do so either as it would free both his host and the intruder from the evil man’s influence, “And for that there’s a Penalty.”

“You dare judge me?” Voldemort demanded, though he looked much less imposing when he was shaking with the effort to stay upright, the only reason he had survived this long being the fact that while the Millennium Items wouldn’t protect him, they had been willing to shield his host and he had been drawing what little magic he could from that protection. “Me? Lord Voldemort?”

“You’re nothing, a pathetic little ant who aspires to a rather hypocritical form of rule.” Powel snarled back, “And you’re done. Penalty Game!”

With those words the black pieces attacked Voldemort who bellowed in agony and anger as the pieces started to destroy him completely. It was at point Powel took himself and his host, who had steadily grown quieter and sleepier as the game had gone on until he’d eventually just toppled over in the corridor, out of the Shadow Realm.


	17. Returning to the UK

Both Ron and the intruder were staring at him as he blinked and slowly came to himself in the real world.

“The bloody hell was that?” Ron demanded, having entered the room as Powel had launched the game and not seen any of it.

“You,” Powel glowered at Shadi, ignoring Ron’s question, “Stay the hell away from me and from my host. We have done nothing wrong and your little trip through our mind nearly cost us everything.”

“If you stay away from the Millennium It...”

“No, no deals. No bargains.” Powel shook his head, furious, “You stay the hell away from us or I’ll do to you what I did to Voldemort. I don’t care what kind of game you’re running or what plans you have, but leave us out of it.”

Shadi considered him for a moment longer then nodded, “I owe you a debt, so I will retreat, for now. But I warn you, should your path cross with that of the Pharaoh, you and I will meet again.”

With that last parting comment Shadi left. The moment he vanished Powel double checked that he had gone, while grumbling about stupid ghosts that were stuck in the past and didn’t know when to leave well enough alone, before switching out with Harry who glanced around the room, saw the look Ron was giving him and held up his hands in a classic ‘don’t shoot’ pose. “Not my fault.”

When Ron just continued to stare Harry lowered his hands and moved over to his friend, knocking on his head like you would a door. “Hello? Anyone home?”

“Gerroff Harry.” Ron protested, backing up with a slightly irritated look. “Why was that guy in our room? And why did his face change?”

Harry shrugged. “You have more idea than I do. I wasn’t really awake for most of it. Try asking my tenant when he wakes up next.” He didn’t really fancy telling Ron that Powel wasn’t the only one who had been inside his head and that the spirit who lived inside his Bracer had just played a Shadow Game against Voldemort. Harry was just lucky in that Ron had never met Voldemort face to face so his friend hadn’t recognised the man’s voice.

Ron didn’t look happy with Harry’s answer, “Ginny remembered what You-Know-Who did while he was... you know, possessing her.”

“Ginny was in the body at the same time as him.” Harry reminded his friend, “I was in the Bracer while Powel was in my body.”

“You make that sound far too normal.” Ron grouched at him before shrugging, “I have the potions. And the suntan lotion for tomorrow.”

Harry more than happily swigged the potion, relaxing slightly as it started to take effect, easing the pain and the stiffness of his sunburnt neck and face. He carefully put the stopped back in and tucked it away in one of the drawers that he’d filled with his new clothes, just in case he needed it the next day.

The next day he learnt what Bill Weasley considered possibly the most important charm he’d learnt since coming to Egypt, a spell that could dampen the effects of the sun on a person’s skin. It hadn’t prevented Bill from tanning heavily while he’d been here, but it had prevented him from obtaining the same level of burning that his siblings had gained.

With the charm cast, Harry spent a rather enjoyable few weeks with Hermione and the Weasleys learning about the Ancient Egyptians and their ways and cultures. That the focus was mainly on the tombs was a little morbid, but considering Bill’s line of work it wasn’t completely unexpected.

Their Hogwarts letters came for them on Harry’s birthday, the day before they were due to fly back to England, and all of the students gave them at least a cursory look over before packing them away to take back with them. Hermione spent most of the day wondering what a ‘Monster Book of Monsters’ was until they came back the hotel much later in the day to find that Harry’s birthday presents had been stopped at the desk, and that the hotel staff would be grateful if they could subdue the one that kept trying to snap at people’s fingers.

Figuring that one had to have come from Hagrid, Harry collected his small number of presents and took them to the atrium where the Weasleys and Hermione were waiting with gifts of their own for him, along with a rather odd looking cake, which turned out to be a honey cake that Molly had managed to find in a local Muggle store.

Harry was right in his assumption that the biting present had come from Hagrid.

“I guess Hagrid likes the Care of Magical Creatures Professor.” Hermione commented when Harry examined his copy of the Monster Book of Monsters, carefully avoiding losing his fingers to the book monster and ending up having to have the twins sit on it to prevent it from escaping.

“Yeah, and the new teacher must be mental to issue books like this.” Ron complained as Harry tied it shut with a piece of rope that Molly conjured, looking ill amused as she did so.

“What did Luna send, Harry?” Fred or George asked, already thinking of ways that they could use the sheer destructive potential of the book and wondering if they were going to get on surprisingly well with the obviously new Professor considering that he apparently had a sense of humour, where as Kettleburn really really hadn’t.

Harry opened the present slowly, wondering what Luna had sent him considering that he hadn’t expected anything from his friend. By the time he was finished opening it he had a few booster packs and a structure deck.

Harry grinned as he read the back of the box, which was full of Winged Beasts and he put it to one side to look through properly later. Luna’s present wasn’t the only surprise. Ron had brought him a pocket-sneakoscope, which was supposed to go off if there was someone untrustworthy nearby. Considering how often people wanted to kill him, Harry considered the gift a rather useful one. Hermione’s was no less practical, but would probably get a considerable amount more use as she had given him a top of the line broomstick servicing kit that would help him keep his Nimbus 2000 in top shape.

Between the cake, the meal that they had in one of the top restaurants in the wizard owned shopping plaza, and the fact that the Weasley parents seemed determined that Harry pay for and do nothing all evening, it was the most fun that Harry had had in a long time.

The next day, however, at the airport the stress was back a hundredfold as once again Harry and Hermione had to herd the Weasleys through the airport. It didn’t help matters that Harry was loaded down with as many trinkets as he was books, a fact that both amused and frustrated his friends, and that Hermione or Ron were not much better. If it hadn’t been for the magically expanded bags that both Harry and Hermione were carrying the family would have had to either confound the woman who weighed their bags or paid the extra fees that would have come with the excess weight they would have been carrying.

With just one day left before term started Harry realised too late that there had been something else in the envelope with the shopping list. That thing being the permission form for Hogsmead that would allow him to join the third years and above at the magical village near to Hogwarts. It was supposed to be signed by your guardian, but Vernon couldn’t sign it, Petunia wouldn’t and somehow he doubted that getting the spirit of the Bracer to sign it would count.

There was a mad rush to buy everything they needed before school started the following day and the majority of shops were closed long before they got back to the Leaky Cauldron, where Lupin was waiting for Harry in order to return ‘Padfoot’ to him.

“Lupin?” Arthur asked, shocked as he realised who Harry had gone to talk to, “It’s been a long time. What’re you doing here?”

“Returning Harry’s dog.” Lupin explained himself, smiling at the Weasley patriarch, having known the man years ago, back before the Order had dissolved after Voldemort’s death, “When I ran into my friend’s son I couldn’t help but do him a favour. How have you been?”

Harry glowered at Padfoot, who had obviously returned before they had, and became amused when the dog cowered slightly before licking his hand and whimpering. Lupin grinned slightly at the sight as the younger Weasleys spent time petting the dog, who just rolled over and took it. He had given Sirius an earful when the man had returned from Egypt the day before Harry, telling him off for taking such a big risk when it was obvious that Wormtail wouldn’t have been foolish enough to return to the Weasley household.

During the conversation between the two men, Harry overheard something interesting. He hoped he was right, since Lupin had been a friend of his father’s but it looked like it might be the first year that he might actually like his Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher.

“I worked out an answer to Harry’s little problem too.” Lupin looked at Harry and Harry looked back, confused as to what Lupin meant by that, “He’ll be able to have both Padfoot and Hedwig with him.”

Harry blinked at him for a moment and then remembered the rule he’d been so worried about, the one that allowed students to take one pet to school only.

Hermione spoke before he could. “But I thought the students were allowed one pet and it had to be an owl, a cat or a toad. There’s nothing in the rules about dogs.”

Lupin chuckled, amused the way Hermione almost quoted the school rules words for word. “I know. But there’s also nothing in the rules about a student looking after a teacher’s pet for them. If I take Padfoot with me, he can go to stay with Harry in the Gryffindor tower every so often.”

Harry grinned, liking the plan as Ron chuckled and Hermione let out a sound that was a combination of amusement and annoyance at yet someone else who was willing to bend the rules into funny shapes. In fact Lupin was worse, since he was a teacher. He was supposed to be setting a good example.

“Thanks, Professor Lupin.” Harry grinned at the teacher to be.

Lupin just shrugged it off, though Harry thought he caught a brief glimpse of a smile on his face, and turned back to his conversation with Mr Weasley, promising to keep in touch before mentioning that he’d probably see them on the train and flooed away.

Harry found himself sharing a heavily edited tale of how he’d run into the teacher in Diagon Alley with the Weasleys as they had dinner, and found himself retelling the tale when Ron and Hermione piled into his room and demanded the truth from him. And they didn’t just mean about his meeting with Lupin.

In the end they were up till almost six in the morning, so it was an exhausted trio that piled onto the train and found an carriage that was empty except for Luna, who grinned at them but helped them put their trunks out of the way and found somewhere for Hedwig’s cage to rest and then pounced on them for information about their trip to Egypt.


	18. Nightmare Creatures

Harry fell asleep midway through the conversation and didn’t wake until the train stopped with a jolt. Worried by the sudden cold and the slightly frightened look on his friends’ faces, he looked around and tried to work out where they were.

“Hogwarts already?” He asked as he got to his feet, stretching as he did so.

“No.” Hermione shook her head, looking around and trying to work out what was going as it continued to get colder and colder as a black robed figure floated outside the door to their compartment, drawing in the light from the area around it. Harry could hear a woman screaming as the door slid open and the creature entered, his world vanishing in a bright flash of green.  
  
“Be gone. There’s no one for you here.” Hermione watched in shock as Harry toppled forward only to catch himself halfway down and stand up straight, except she didn’t think it was Harry. Not with the amber eyes. The boy in place of her friend drew Harry’s wand out of his back pocket and pointed it at the creature, “Expecto Patronum!”

A silvery light erupted from Harry’s wand, taking the shape of a silver serpent which launched itself at the robed figure in front of them. The creature ran away, the glowing silver serpent in fast pursuit.

“And stay out!” Powel bellowed after the Dementor, knowing full damn well what it was that had invaded his host’s carriage and brought to the fore memories so bad that it had caused Harry to pass out. Powel didn’t doubt that, had he been in control he wouldn’t have been in a much better state. The spirit of the Bracer went to re-enter his carriage only for a hand to grasp his shoulder.

“You might want to dismiss your patronus, Harry.” Lupin said softly, a look of confusion and concern on his face.

Powel shook his head, glowering at Lupin as he did so, “Not until I know the Dementor is off of the train.”

Lupin paused for a moment, impressed by the bravery shown in wanting to protect his friends and shocked by both the sheer power radiating off the boy in front of him and the skill shown in being able to cast the patronus at such a young age. Then he nodded his understanding. “The Dementors are here on Ministry orders. They’re looking for Sirius Black.” Lupin explained, “They’ll think you’re hiding him if you won’t let them search your carriage.”

Powel scowled before whispering, “And Padfoot?”

Lupin scowled slightly, remembering the twitching mess that the black furred canine had been reduced to before the Dementor had left the room, “He’ll be fine.”

Powel scowled at the implications that his host’s Godfather wasn’t ‘fine’ now but took the hint. If he wanted Harry to remain whole and sound, he would dismiss his patronus before the Dementors came back. He waved his host’s wand and the snake he had summoned slowly faded away.

“Chocolate?” Lupin asked, tossing Powel a chocolate frog from the pile of chocolates that had been piled up on the table in Harry’s compartment while Harry had been snoozing.

Powel opened the packaging, and watched, fascinated as the chocolate frog inside tried to escape, managing to catch it before it fell on the floor and biting it’s head off.

“Feeling vindictive?” Lupin looked amused.

Powel just snorted at him, ill amused by the entire situation. When he met the idiot who had decided that letting Dementors live around children without teaching the children how to defend themselves from them was a good idea, he was going to rip the man limb from limb. Slowly. Starting with the guy’s toes.

“Stay in here with your friends.” Lupin recommended, “I’ll see what’s going on.”

Powel nodded and re-entered the compartment to find that Harry’s friends were staring at him. “Yes?” He asked grouchily, poking at Harry’s mind, trying to wake the boy up so he could go back to sleep and not getting very far.

“You lack any of the subtlety you used to have.” Luna said, causing Powel to pause midway through eating a second piece of chocolate and look at the girl properly, trying to work out whether it was Luna or Helga talking and slightly envious of Helga’s control over her subconscious illusions.

Powel opened his mouth to speak, but Hermione beat him to the punch.

“You’re not Harry, are you?” She demanded, worried about her friend.

“Are you sure she doesn’t hold Ravenclaw’s Pendant?” Luna asked, confirming in Powel’s mind that it was Helga talking.

“I don’t have a Serpent Item.” Hermione snapped, angry at being deflected. “Now answer my question!”

“No, I’m not. My name is Powel Redgrave, not Harry Potter.” Powel growled, still feeling like crap from exposure to the Dementor, both from his host’s experience and his own and not needing to go through this discussion right now. To his relief, his host finally responded to his nudging and stirred slightly.

Without a second thought Powel dropped Harry in control and retreated to the Bracer.

“Damn.” Hermione complained, “I wanted to know what that spell was he used to scare it away. Dementors don’t scare easily.”

“It’s called the Patronus Charm.” Helga explained, “It’s the only thing that can repel a Dementor. There are spells that can kill them, but unfortunately I’ve forgotten them and it looks like Powel has too.”

That appealed to Hermione’s insane research drive and she instantly started thinking through the books in the school library and the books Harry had picked up over the summer, trying to think if there was anything in the ones she had read about how to destroy a Dementor.

Ron, however, was watching Harry who was looking pale and hadn’t said a word since he’d been shoved back into control by the spirit of his Serpent Item. “You alright Harry? Lupin said chocolate helps.”

Harry nodded listlessly and picked up a chocolate bar, quickly eating it and regaining some of his colour. “Sorry if I scared anyone.”

“Did you pass out?” Helga asked him, making Harry embarrassed. Somehow it was worse a Founder knowing than it was his friends. On the plus side Powel had made sure he wasn’t a drooling idiot by taking over the moment he had passed out but it was still embarrassing.

“You’re not the first.” Helga informed him, taking his silence for the confirmation it was. “We all had issues with Dementors. Even Godric struggled when brought face to face with them. It’s why Powel was so keen on learning the Patronus charm.”

That made sense and it kind of made Harry feel better, to know that he wasn’t being judged for his inability to stand up against the creature. Then a thought hit him. “Who screamed?”

“Huh?” Ron asked.

“No one screamed, Harry.” Hermione shook her head.

“It was probably a memory.” Luna said, taking control back from the spirit of her Comb, “The Dementors can do that you know, make you relieve your worst memories.”

“But...” Harry was confused, but he didn’t say anything more, just let the chatter of his friends keep him occupied on the rest of the journey, stepping out only to change into his school robes and taking care to hide the Bracer underneath his robes, though he wasn’t sure it would be enough once he was back in the hustle and bustle of the school.

**Author's Note:**

> And that's all I have for this part of this universe. I have many ideas for later, including when they first meet Yugi and co but this book has kind of stalled horribly...


End file.
